A prominent pediatrician accused of mowing down a father and his 6-year-old daughter confessed to a good Samaritan nurse before leaving the scene of the accident, the nurse told the Post.
Police say Dr. Sam Luuzzi, 66, was riding on the shoulders of Guy Seth, 51, and his father at busy Arthur Kill and Drumgoole streets in Greenridge on January 9. He drove a black GMC truck to his daughter Zoe.
The girl suffered a fractured skull and required emergency brain surgery.
Her father suffered a concussion.
The off-duty nurse claims Luuzzi did not render aid to either victim and remained silent when arriving officers asked about the driver, as attorneys have suggested.
“I think he [Leuzzi] “As a responsible adult, I was going to call the police,” said the furious nurse, who requested anonymity. “I said to him, ‘What happened?’ And he said to me, ‘I didn’t see it.’ I didn’t see it. ”
The off-duty nurse said she drove to the scene “very rainy” after 5pm and found Guy Seth unconscious on the road and little Zoe “falling out of her shoe” on the sidewalk. He said he found it.
Luzzi was standing next to a “crying” girl.
The veteran nurse said Luzzi was “not at all shocked and very calm” but held an umbrella over his head while he “knelt down to assess” his father.
She thought the pediatrician would talk to the arriving police, but the police “asked her 100 times, ‘Who’s the driver?'” she said. Where is the driver? ”
A nurse who viewed police body camera footage and gave a statement to police at the 123rd Precinct the next day said Luzzi acted “like a bystander.”
She said body cameras showed Luzzi “standing around.” After Guy and Zoe are loaded into the ambulance, we see him casually walking towards the truck. He put on his blinkers, worked slowly, and drove away. ”
Mr. Luzzi, of Middletown, New Jersey, has a thriving practice in the Grant City area of Staten Island.
He was arrested the day after the accident and charged with misdemeanor counts of leaving the scene of an accident without reporting, violating the right of way and failing to comply with the law of due care, according to a criminal complaint.
“I was driving and I was trying to make a left turn and I hit a pedestrian, an adult, a child,” he later told investigators, according to the complaint.
“I didn’t tell anyone that I was the driver, and I didn’t give out my information because no one asked. I left. I felt terrible about what had happened, so I left in the morning. I was going to the police station.”
Neither the Staten Island District Attorney’s Office nor the State Court Administration Office would say why Leuzzi was arraigned virtually from the hospital.
He pleaded not guilty and was released on his own recognizance.
Lawyer Ravi Batra, who is representing Seth’s family, said a nurse also told them that Luuzzi had confessed that his car had hit Guy and Zoe and that he had failed to render aid at the scene.
Batra is now asking prosecutors McMahon to upgrade the misdemeanor charge against Luzzi to a serious injury scene discharge (E-felony).
In a Feb. 1 letter to the DA’s office, Batra charged that the pediatrician “walked around the scene of the accident and listened to the story, then dismissed the incident as a hit-and-run.” [the nurse] — who was helping the victims — held an umbrella over her and knew he had caused them “serious injuries.” ”
The letter continues: “Shockingly, Sam Luzzi did not provide any medical treatment at the scene before sneaking away to avoid moral and legal responsibility.”
Mr Batra said Zoe had a titanium plate in her head and Mr Guy was suffering from a head injury and double vision.
“I don’t want this to be a hit-and-walk,” Batra told the Post.
Luzzi’s lawyer, Joseph Corozzo, previously argued that his client “remained at the scene and cared for both parties, waiting for an ambulance to take father and daughter to the hospital.”
He also said the NYPD and the District Attorney’s Office “presented evidence proving this was an accident that occurred during a severe and severe storm.”
