The man accused of drunk driving and plowing into a Long Island nail salon at 78 mph, killing four people, including an off-duty NYPD officer, apparently doesn’t think much of his victims.
During an exclusive 35-minute jailhouse interview with The Washington Post this week, the self-centered Steven Schwalli didn’t mention Officer Emilia Renhack or the three salon employees he shot and killed in the June 28 incident until a reporter asked him what he would say to the grieving families if he had the chance.
Schwary, 64, first asked the reporter how he would respond to the question, before saying he would convey his “sorry” for the harm he had caused.
He quickly added: “I don’t want to think about it.”
The twice-divorced, unemployed and homeless former Marine said he remembers emergency personnel pulling him out of the driver’s side window of his Chevrolet Traverse after his car crashed into Hawaii Nail & Spa in Deer Park, and he remembers seeing how much damage his car had done, but doesn’t remember anything else.
Schwary had pleaded not guilty when charged with four counts of second-degree murder and other charges, but told The Washington Post in an interview at Riverhead Correctional Facility, where he is being held on $1 million bail, “I’m guilty.”
“It’s over,” Schwary said of his life, wearing a yellow prison uniform and with a walker at his side. “It’s over.”
Schwary admitted to The Washington Post that he is an alcoholic and is believed to have downed several bottles of Montebello Long Island Iced Tea before injuring nine people in the shocking attack.
A typical day outside, he said, involves getting up, buying some booze, driving around the local area and stopping to make some phone calls.
Authorities said Schwary told police he had drunk 18 beers around 3 a.m. on the day of the crash and had stopped drinking.
Schwary spent a week in hospital immediately after the incident, complaining that prison staff had given him so many drugs that he could not sleep.
Schwary claims that he is not “always drunk” and that he only started drinking alcohol about 25 years ago.
Schwary was charged with drunk driving after breaking a mailbox in Dix Hills, New York, in 2013. He pleaded guilty and received three years’ probation.
Family members of the Hawaii Nail & Spa victims either declined to comment or could not immediately be reached.
