Press Release

QUEENS MAN SENTENCED TO PRISON FOR HIT AND RUN CRASH THAT KILLED TEENAGER ON SCOOTER

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced today that Charles Fleming, 55, has been sentenced to up to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to aggravated vehicular homicide. The defendant struck two teenagers on a motorized scooter on October 2019, in Jamaica, Queens, and then fled the scene.

District Attorney Katz said, “Every driver who gets behind the wheel of a car bears a responsibility to maintain safe driving conditions and to follow the rules of the road. This defendant selfishly consumed alcohol, drove erratically, struck two individuals and fled the scene. Tragically, a young woman died as a result of this defendant’s actions. It is my hope that today’s sentencing brings a measure of justice and provides the victim’s family and friends a sense of closure.”

Fleming, of Beach 17 Street in Far Rockaway, Queens, pleaded guilty in May to aggravated vehicular homicide before Queens Supreme Court Justice Gene Lopez. Today, Justice Lopez ordered the defendant to serve an indeterminate 5 to 15 years in prison.

District Attorney Katz said that at approximately 11:51 p.m. on October 12, 2019, police responded to the scene of a crash near the intersection of Rockaway Boulevard and Guy R. Brewer Boulevard. The defendant had been traveling southbound on Rockaway Boulevard in a 2013 blue Infiniti G37. Also moving in the same direction was a red electric scooter being driven by Eternity Stevens, 19, with a female passenger in the back. The defendant, who was driving at a high rate of speed, struck the scooter and both girls were thrown in the air before landing on the pavement.

Continuing, said the DA, Fleming drove away from the area leaving without offering aid or calling for an ambulance. When responding emergency personnel did arrive at the scene, the victims were rushed to a nearby hospital. The now 25-year-old passenger of the scooter was treated for a fractured pelvis and has since fully recovered. Miss Stevens, however, suffered severe head trauma and died as a result of the collision.

According to the charges, the defendant was stopped by members of the Nassau Police Department around midnight on the Nassau Expressway within Long Island. A portable breathalyzer test given to the defendant at 12:30 a.m., showed his blood alcohol content to be approximately 0.186 percent – which is more than twice the legal limit of .08 in New York City.

Assistant District Attorney Gabriel Mendoza, a Supervisor with the District Attorney’s Violent Criminal Enterprise Bureau, prosecuted the case, with the assistance of Bryan Kotowski of the Homicide Bureau, under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Jonathan Sennett, Bureau Chief, and under the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations Gerard Brave.

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