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BROOKLYN WEEKLY, DECEMBER 1, 2019
Three charged with manslaughter
for construction worker’s death
BY BEN VERDE
Three men have been indicted
on manslaughter charges
for the death of a construction
worker in Brooklyn — who was
crushed under thousands of
pounds of debris while working
at an unsafe construction site,
according to District Attorney
Eric Gonzalez.
“This is no mistake, this is
not an accident,” said Gonzalez.
“This is a direct result of owner
recklessness and neglect, and
the people who are in charge of
this project were simply motivated
by monetary reasons.”
The operator of the site and
two of his business partners
face second-degree manslaughter
charges for allegedly ignoring
multiple warning signs of
dangerous conditions at the
construction spot — near 39th
Street and Seventh Avenue —
where 47-year-old Luis Almonte
Sanchez was crushed by a falling
wall and killed instantly in
September 2018, according to
authorities.
Investigators alleged that
the defendants skirted multiple
city regulations while overseeing
the construction, and had
been alerted to the potentially
dangerous conditions by both
workers and neighbors — to no
avail.
“These defendants discounted
the City’s construction
code, making up the rules
as they went along, creating the
perfect conditions for a disaster
that ultimately cost a worker
his life,” said Department of Investigation
Commissioner Margaret
Garnett.
In one instance, a woman
who lived directly adjacent to
the construction site told the
defendants that her patio and
garage had caved in — but they
ordered the construction crew
to continue operations, without
installing additional bracing or
pausing work, according to investigators.
Making matters worse, the
defendants allegedly ordered
crews to continue excavation of
the building’s basement during
a heavy rainstorm — by removing
truckloads of dirt — which
further compromised the building’s
stability, according to the
DA’s office.
“Cutting corners on the
work site costs lives,” said Department
of Buildings Commissioner
Melanie La Rocca. “Luis
Almonte Sanchez is no longer
with us due to the defendants’
callous disregard for even the
most basic excavation safety
regulations, in service of padding
their own bank accounts.”
Throughout all of their suspect
business practices, the
three manslaughter defendants
had scrapped the plans
that they had submitted to the
Building’s Department, and
“ultimately didn’t follow any
plans,” according to the District
Attorney’s office.
The unsafe work conditions
prevented first responders
from retrieving Sanchez’s body
for over 24 hours after the wall
— weighing between 15,000 and
45,000 pounds — collapsed on
him, authorities said.
The site of Sanchez’s fatality
was not the first problematic
construction site run by the defendants,
according to the District
Attorney, who accused the
suspects of operating another
worksite on Bay Ridge Parkway
in 2017-2018, that ignored multiple
stop-work orders stemming
from various Department of
Building violations.
Additionally, the construction
site operator had previously
been convicted of bribing
a Department of Buildings
official on a separate project
— and was only able to obtain
permits for the project where
Sanchez was killed by setting
up a shadow company where
his name was not used in any
official capacity.
Following Sanchez’s death,
department investigators inspected
every construction site
associated with the defendants
to prevent similar tragedies,
according department reps.
In addition to operating the
treacherous work sites, Gonzalez’s
office accused the company
of stealing $47,000 from
the New York State Insurance
Fund by falsifying insurance
records, and skirting over
$28,000 in taxes between 2015
and 2016.
The three main defendants
were charged with second-degree
manslaughter, criminally
First responders were unable to retrieve the victim’s body for over 24 hours. Photo by Paul Martinka
negligent homicide, and seconddegree
reckless endangerment.
A fourth defendant was also
indicted for criminally negligent
homicide and second degree
reckless endangerment.
A fifth defendant — a bookkeeper
for one of the companies
— was indicted on various
charges related to their alleged
financial impropriety.
The District Attorney also
brought charges specifically
against the two companies involved
in Sanchez’s fatality —
including second-degree manslaughter,
criminally negligent
homicide, and second-degree
reckless endangerment.
All seven defendants face a
litany of other charges — including
grand larceny, criminal
tax fraud, and criminal possession
of a forged instrument.
Coney shocked by Nazi grafi ti
BY ROSE ADAMS
Locals were left appalled after
a swastika was found sketched
into a park bench near a Jewish
center in Coney Island on Nov.
21.
“The sensitivity that’s related
to this type of anti-Semitism is a
source of devastating emotional
trauma,” said Rabbi Moshe Wiener,
the executive director of the
Jewish Community Council of
Greater Coney Island. “This is
defi nitely a source of immense
trauma for the populations we’re
dealing with.”
A jogger fi rst spotted the hateful
symbol scribbled on a bench
along the Coney Island Boardwalk
near W. 37th Street at 4:15
pm — just steps from the religious
institution’s entrance, according
to offi cials.
The organization — located on
W. 37th Street between the boardwalk
and Surf Avenue — serves
the one of largest populations of
Holocaust survivors in the city,
at about 3,000 survivors per year,
A jogger saw a swastika drawn on a bench near the Jewish Community
Council on Nov. 21. Photo courtesy of Chaim Deutsch
according to Weiner.
The Police Department’s Hate
Crime Task Force is investigating
the anti-Semitic graffi ti, according
to a police spokesperson.
The recent incident is not the
fi rst time the hateful symbol has
been found near Coney Island
over the last year — as swastikas
were found scrawled in Brighton
Beach Playground in February
and at the Brighton Beach Library
late last year.
Hate crimes citywide increased
33-percent between January
and October compared with
the same time frame last year —
with crimes targeting the Jewish
community rising 63-percent, according
to authorities.