A tragic turn of events has left one man dead – and a teenager – a “very good kid,” according to neighbors – exonerated.
Alfred Barcenilla, 18, had been driving a 2008 Lexus westbound on Sutter Avenue near 85th Street in Ozone Park in the early-morning hours of Sunday, August 23, when, according to a police source, he traveled around a stopped taxi. It was at that point, says the source, that Barcenilla saw a bus headed in his direction; he swerved, allegedly lost control of the vehicle, and struck Donald Bryan, a Javits Center security guard who had taken a cab home to his apartment on a quiet, tree-lined Tudor Village street.
Bryan, 31, was reportedly hit head on and flipped over the Lexus, landing on its trunk and shattering the rear windshield. He was taken to Jamaica Hospital, where he died.
Barcenilla was taken into custody and was initially charged with operating a vehicle after consuming alcohol under 21 years old.
Numerous media outlets had reported that he was inebriated at the time of the accident, but the police source said that he was taken for DWI testing at the 112th Precinct, where “he blew a zero and they had to release him.”
“He was not drunk,” said the source. “Initially they thought he was drunk, but he wasn’t.”
The source told The Courier that she does not believe speed was a factor in the accident either.
Barcenilla was then released “with no further pending charges.”
At Bryan’s residence, his upstairs neighbor became visibly upset a day after the fatal accident.
“You couldn’t find a better neighbor,” she said, declining to give her name. “He was wonderful, quiet, he kept to himself.”
Landlord Donna Mae DePola agreed.
“He was a great guy, my first tenant. I just liked him,” she said.
DePola, who is the director of a drinking/driving program in Manhattan and Brooklyn, told The Courier that Barcenilla, who is set to head off to college, “wasn’t a kid that drank,” and that he had never been in trouble before.
“At night, in the dark, you can’t see anybody at that intersection,” she said.
Comment on this story
