UPPER EAST SIDE — A valet who drove a luxury SUV down an Upper East Side elevator shaft Tuesday, plummeting five floors and nearly crushing a man in the elevator car below, will not face charges for having a suspended license, officials confirmed.
Steven Morales, 21, had been arrested Tuesday for driving without a license and for aggravated unlicensed operation of a vehicle, after plunging a Lexus RX 350 down the shaft from the fifth floor of the City Valet parking garage at 355 E. 76th St.
But prosecutors have declined to pursue a case against Morales, who has had his license suspended 11 times, according to NYPD.
Morales, who sustained head injuries, crash-landed on top of an elevator on the ground floor of the building, which also houses a Hertz Rent-a-Car center.
The man in the elevator was able to escape before the 4,500-pound car crushed the elevator.
Morales was trapped inside the car until the FDNY used the jaws of life to break him free. Both men work at City Valet, fire officials said.
The Manhattan District Attorney's office declined to comment.
Both men were taken to New York Presbyterian-Weill Cornell Medical Center with non-life-threatening injuries.
