Lion Head’s Lion Demolished
There were three bad car crashes in town in recent days, all of them followed by misdemeanor charges of driving while intoxicated or high on drugs.
At about 8 a.m. on Sunday, according to East Hampton Town police, Renaldo Valentino Barnes of East Hampton, 20, smashed through one of two brick and concrete pillars demarking the Lion Head Beach Association in Springs and then tried to outrun police on a skateboard. Mr. Barnes, a 2015 East Hampton High School graduate, is said to have been high on drugs.
Police had received a call reporting a car crash near 5 Isle of Wight Road. An officer arrived in time to see Mr. Barnes walking away from a wrecked 2005 Chevrolet, which had apparently rammed the pillar at a high rate of speed. Both pillar and car were destroyed, along with a concrete lion atop the pillar.
Spotting the officer, Mr. Barnes started skateboarding down the street, then jumped off and ran into the woods, police said. He reportedly resisted before being handcuffed.
He suffered serious though not life-threatening injuries, said Capt. Chris Anderson, and an ambulance was called to take him to Southampton Hospital. En route, however, the decision was made to fly him to Stony Brook University Hospital’s trauma center instead, where he was admitted. At the hospital, Captain Anderson said, Mr. Barnes consented to have blood drawn. It will be tested by Suffolk County medical examiners to determine if he had drugs in his system at the time of the crash.
In addition to the charge of driving while ability impaired by drugs, Mr. Barnes, who has since been released from the hospital, faces a felony charge of criminal mischief for destroying the pillar, and a misdemeanor charge of resisting arrest. He is to be arraigned in East Hampton Town Justice Court on Wednesday.
The driver in another Sunday crash, David A. Steckowski, also fled the scene, police said, reporting that shortly after sunset, driving a 2014 Ford pickup truck on Long Lane near the high school, he had swerved from his lane to pass a 2014 Porsche whose driver, Tina Georgopoulos, had slowed down as she went by the high school. The front of the Ford hit the rear of the Porsche, damaging the truck’s right front tire and causing significant damage to both vehicles.
Mr. Steckowski then kept going, according to police, whipping around the dog-leg corners that connect Long Lane to Newtown Lane. He got as far as Gould Street, close to his Cedar Street residence, where the truck broke down.
“I had two margaritas in Sag Harbor,” he told the arresting officer. “I hit another car on Long Lane. The other car was going slow, so I went around them. Are the other people okay?” Each driver had a passenger with them; none of the four required medical attention.
At police headquarters in Wainscott, Mr. Steckowski agreed to take the breath test, which reportedly produced a reading of .16, double the .08 number that defines intoxication. Besides the charge of D.W.I., he was charged with leaving the scene of an accident.
He was released the next morning without bail, in recognition of his lifetime roots in East Hampton, but with a future date on Justice Steven Tekulsky’s criminal calendar.
Drunken driving was also the charge against a Springs woman, Alexandra Moret, 47, who crashed into a stopped car at the intersection of Springs-Fireplace Road and Fort Pond Boulevard at about 5:10 p.m. on Nov. 30. The driver of the other car, Wendy Verity of Springs, complained of back pain and was taken to Southampton Hospital, where she was treated and later released. Both vehicles were badly damaged and were towed away.
Police said that when an officer arrived, Ms. Moret was standing outside her 2016 Volkswagen. “I had one glass of wine,” she said, but the officer said she failed roadside sobriety tests and refused to take a breath test, both at the site and later at headquarters. Besides the D.W.I. charge, she was charged with unsafe lane-changing.
Two ambulances were called, but Ms. Moret declined medical attention.
She was arraigned last Thursday before Justice Lisa R. Rana. Her lawyer, Edward Burke Jr., entered a not-guilty plea on her behalf. His client had been returning from a trip out of town at the time of the accident, he told the court.
The prosecutor, Rudy Migliore Jr. of the district attorney’s office, acknowledged that Ms. Moret had never been in trouble with the law before, but pointed out the serious nature of the incident, adding that she had only moved into the area recently. He asked that bail be set at $1,000, an amount Mr. Burke said Ms. Moret was ready to post.
Justice Rana told the defendant, whose job is in sales, which normally requires driving, that she was not eligible for a hardship license because she had refused the breath test at headquarters, and warned her not to drive while the charges are pending. A hearing at the Department of Motor Vehicles over her refusal to take the test is scheduled for today. The administrative judge who hears the case could suspend Ms. Moret’s license for the next year.