By Shayna Jacobs
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A Gristedes van driver testified Thursday that he wasn't drunk when the van he was driving struck and killed a pregnant woman and badly injured her friend in Midtown nearly two years ago.
Keston Brown, 28, told jurors he was not impaired when he was driving a badly damaged maintenance work van in March of last year, although he admitting to enjoying several beers and a shot of Hennessy at lunch after a long work week.
"I really don't drink. I spend time with my kids and my wife — that's it," Brown insisted after telling prosecutors he did not feel the effects of the shot and three light beers.
However, prosecutors said police measured Brown's blood alcohol level at .18 percent at the precinct, more than twice the legal limit of .08 percent in New York State.
Brown insisted he was sober and trying to control the van, which he claimed was faulty and had stopped running as he drove it through Manhattan on March 27, 2009. He could not brake and swerved onto the East 37th Street sidewalk, severing the body of 29-year-old Ysemny Ramos in half, according to testimony.
He described how he climbed out of the vehicle to assess the damage the collision had caused.
"I tried to bring person out from under the vehicle...then I realized there was nothing left of the person," Brown said calmly on the witness stand during testimony.
Ramos, who was three months pregnant, was walking home from work with her friend Tassia Katsiambanis, 37, who suffered several injuries.
Brown faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted of manslaughter.
