The New York Post

 

August 24, 2003, Sunday

 

 By Carl Corry and Cynthia Fagen

Police were searching last night for a hit-and-run driver who nearly decimated a group of Long Island family and friends.

 

The five are lucky to be alive today after the driver mowed them down with a van as they tried to change a tire on the shoulder of the Long Island Expressway Thursday night.

 

The crash sent all five victims to area hospitals. Two remained hospitalized yesterday in serious condition at Stony Brook University hospital.

 

"I can't even close my eyes, because every time I close my eyes, I see that truck," said crash victim Carlos Vargas of Bay Shore, who had been helping his stranded brother, Jimmy, fix the flat on the highway shoulder near the Hauppauge exit.

 

"I jumped out of the way and I pushed Stephanie [Jimmy's girlfriend] out of the way," he said at a hospital waiting room where he was visiting his seriously injured brother.

 

The terrifying crash occurred on the westbound L.I.E. at around 8:40 p.m., when 25-year-old Jimmy Vargas, of Bay Shore, pulled his 1995 Honda Civic onto the expressway shoulder after his car got a flat near Exit 56.

 

He called his family for help.

 

Carlos Vargas and his cousin, Lorenzo Rivera, 25, went in one car, a 1991 Ford Mustang, while Jimmy's girlfriend, Stephanie Amador, 23, and Carlos' girlfriend, Danielle Petrine, 18, drove in a red Honda Civic to the scene.

 

The Honda drove up behind Vargas and the Mustang parked in front of the others as Jimmy Vargas was pulling out a tire from the trunk of his car.

 

Police said all five were standing on the shoulder of the expressway when a 2002 GMC white box van came careening out of control and plowed into them.

 

The van hit the first car, Stephanie's red Honda, "causing a chain reaction," said Suffolk Detective Sgt. William Rand.

 

Rivera and Jimmy Vargas could not get out of the way in time and the red Honda smashed into them.

 

The impact sent Jimmy Vargas flying "about 100 feet into the air," said family friend Jose Rodriguez, who was at home at the time.

 

Jimmy Vargas broke both legs in several places and suffered head injuries.

 

"They thought he was dead," Rodriguez said.

 

The red Honda struck the disabled Honda, which then spun around and rammed into the third car, Carlos Vargas' Mustang.

 

The van then sped away. None of the injured was able to get a good look at the van driver, said Carlos Vargas.

 

Jimmy Vargas was airlifted to Stony Brook, where he remains in serious but stable condition.

 

Also injured were Petrone and Carlos Vargas, who were taken to Stony Brook hospital.

 

The van was found with a smashed right front side in the Commack Mall a short time later.

 

Rand urged anyone who witnessed the crash or may have seen the driver of the van near the Commack Mutliplex mall in Commack to call police at (800) 222-TIPS.  (p. 4 metro)