The crash, on Richmond Terrace near Simonson Ave. in Staten Island early Friday, killed a 51-year-old union operating engineer who was crossing the street to enter the Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company, where he worked
An NYPD cop was charged with vehicular manslaughter and drunken driving after he struck and killed a pedestrian in Staten Island while off-duty early Friday and fled the scene.
The crash that claimed the life of William (Bruce) Hemphill, 51, occurred on Richmond Terrace near Simonson Ave. in Mariners Harbor at 6:18 a.m., police said.
Police Officer Joseph McClean, 29, who is assigned to the 121st Precinct in Staten Island and had worked the 4 p.m.-midnight shift on Thursday, was driving east on Richmond Terrace when he hit Hemphill, who was crossing Simonson Ave. after leaving a bodega, police sources and witnesses said.
Hemphill, a union operating engineer and grandfather of five from Maryland, rented a room above the bodega and was crossing the street to enter the Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company shipping office, where he worked.
“The guy hit him so hard he landed a block away. He hit him and he kept on going,” said the bodega’s owner, Mike Kalbouneh.
Hemphill had his hard hat on, but he didn’t stand a chance.
Local resident William Vidal, 53, who lives down the block from where Hemphill was hit, said he heard a loud “Boom!” that he said sounded like two cars colliding. He said he looked out the window and saw Hemphill “literally flipping” through the air.
“I didn’t even think it was a person,” Vidal said. “I thought it was a car part or something like that.”
Vidal said he and his flatmate, Thomas Ramirez, 46, who called 911, ran outside and were appalled at what they saw.
“Just looking at him, I didn’t think he was going to make it. His foot was twisted behind him, and his stomach was bloated,” Vidal said. “I was taking his pulse. It was very faint.”
Judging by where Kalbouneh said he saw the SUV hit Hemphill, a Daily News reporter estimated the victim traveled roughly 30 yards through the air.
“There were no skid marks. He didn’t even make an attempt to stop,” Vidal said, referring to McClean.
Paramedics rushed Hemphill to a Staten Island hospital, where he died at 6:48 a.m., police said.
Ramirez said that about 15 minutes after the accident, as he was talking to responding officers, McClean suddenly returned to the crash site.
“I’m walking with the cops,” Ramirez told The News. “I say to him, ‘I can’t believe this scumbag didn’t stop.’ All of a sudden I hear, ‘It was me. I did it.’ ”
Ramirez said McClean came out of nowhere, quietly approached the responding officers, and confessed.
“He just looked shocked,” Ramirez added. “He didn’t look drunk. He wasn’t staggering. He just looked like ‘What the hell did I just do?’”
In making his return, McClean had parked his Ford SUV on Richmond Terrace near Lake Ave., not far from the point where Hemphill’s body landed. The vehicle had significant front-end damage, and its windshield was shattered and had a massive indentation.
McClean told police that he drove just a few blocks away before choosing to turn around, police sources said.
“I’m coming from my girl’s place,” he told the cops, according to one police source who was not able to say whether McClean had meant he was there prior to the crash or during the interval before he returned.
McClean refused to take a field sobriety test, the sources said, but submitted to a Breathalyzer exam that showed he had a blood-alcohol content of 0.076, just below the legal limit of 0.08.
Officers also noticed he smelled of alcohol, had a flushed face, watery eyes and slurred speech, according to the criminal complaint lodged against him at his arraignment Friday.
When asked if he had been drinking, a police source said, McClean replied: “I’m not talking about that without my rep.” He was referring to his representative with the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association.
The complaint referenced a blood-alcohol content of 0.073, which police sources said was the reading from a second Breathalyzer exam, this time administered at a local police precinct stationhouse.
He was arraigned on felony counts of second-degree vehicular manslaughter and driving while intoxicated. His bail was set at $50,000; it was not immediately clear if he had posted it.
Hemphill’s family was stunned to learn the driver who hit him was a cop and that he did not remain at the scene.
“He’s supposed to protect and serve, but he didn’t protect or serve,” said Hemphill’s daughter, Kelly-Mae, 23. “He was drinking and driving and took my dad’s life in a minute and left him like a piece of trash on the side of the road.”
Kalbouneh, the bodega owner who was also Hemphill’s landlord, said the victim had bought his lunch for the day — a dish of chicken Teriyaki and rice, three iced-tea drinks and a Sunny Delight — moments before he was killed.
Kalbouneh said Hemphill was a friendly man and an outdoorsman, who loved to hunt and fish.
“He was a very good guy. He would come here every day; he brought me a lot of customers [from the docks where he worked],” Kalbouneh said. “I’m very sad. I feel like I’m depressed. I was crying all morning.”
The bodega owner added that Hemphill rented the room from him because his schedule allowed him to work for several weeks, then take a corresponding period off, during which he would return to his home in Maryland.
“He was always talking about going home and catching fish and hunting,” Kalbouneh recalled.
Since 2007, Hemphill had been a member of the International Union of Operating Engineers, Local 25. The local’s president, Scott Winter, said everyone knew Hemphill as “Bruce.”
“He was loved by all of his union brothers, and the company really liked him; they kept working him steady,” Winter said.
Hemphill’s father, Winter said, had been a member of the union for more than 50 years. Winter said he accompanied Hemphill’s father to identify his son’s body.
“He’s all broken up. This is just so tough for him,” Winter said, explaining that the father had recently lost a daughter to a fire, and his wife to illness.
