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Hit-And-Runs Kill 3 Within 4 Hours in Brooklyn, Queens and The Bronx

By  Leslie Albrecht Aidan Gardiner and Jeff Mays | February 28, 2016 9:38pm | Updated on February 29, 2016 10:44am

 A 41-year-old cyclist was killed in a hit-and-run crash at Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue on Sunday, Feb. 28 at 4:58 a.m., police said.
A 41-year-old cyclist was killed in a hit-and-run crash at Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue on Sunday, Feb. 28 at 4:58 a.m., police said.
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DNAinfo/Leslie Albrecht

PARK SLOPE — A 41-year-old man was killed by a hit-and-run driver on Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue early Sunday morning, the third fatal hit-and-run in less than a four-hour period Sunday, police said.

The man, who police did not immediately identify, was crossing Fifth Avenue when he was hit by a Nissan Altima that ran a red light at about 4:56 a.m., police said. The driver didn't stop and fled south on Fifth Avenue, police said. Police originally said the man was on a bike when he was hit.

Officers found the injured man in the street with severe trauma to his body, according to the NYPD. He was rushed by ambulance to New York Methodist Hospital in Park Slope, where he was pronounced dead, police said.

Later Sunday, investigators released footage of the the Nissan they said hit him. It's missing its passenger-side mirror, its bumper is broken and its left headlight is inoperable, police said. The four-door car is either light brown or tan, police said.

(NYPD)

The collision was one of three fatal hit-and-runs early Sunday. At 1:26 a.m., a 63-year-old man was hit and killed by a driver in a black SUV who fled the scene at East 175th Street and Webster Avenue in the Bronx, police said. At 4:40 a.m., 48-year-old Besik Shengelia was hit and killed by an unidentified car near 111th Street and 109th Avenue in Queens.

No arrests had been made in connection with any of the hit-and-runs as of Sunday evening.

But by 11:30 p.m. Sunday, another person was fatally hit by a car in Parkchester. A 33-year-old man, whose name was not immediately released, was lying in the left lane of Unionport Road when a Ford Escape swerved to go around two double-parked cars and ran him over near McGraw Avenue, police said.

The man was pronounced dead at Jacobi Medical Center, police said. It wasn't immediately clear why he was lying in the roadway.

The driver briefly continued, making a right onto McGraw Avenue, where he stopped and was later questioned by police, NYPD officials said. There were no arrests as of Monday morning, police said.

The Park Slope crash happened at the same intersection where a van drove into a bodega, injuring two people, in April 2013.

Sunday's death at Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue prompted local street safety advocates Park Slope Neighbors to revive a 2014 petition asking the city to make the neighborhood into a "slow zone" where the speed limit would be 20 mph throughout.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking at an unrelated press conference in Washington Heights, said it was "disgusting" that anyone would "kill another human being or hurt another human being and drive off. There's absolutely no excuse. And the penalties are severe but they should be even more severe. "

But de Blasio stood by his Vision Zero plan to reduce traffic deaths.

"Vision Zero has brought us the lowest speed limit, it's brought us a lot more enforcement by the NYPD of speeding and failing to yield to pedestrians," he continued. "We are doing a lot more intersection of people who might be drunk drivers, so there's more checkpoints but they're not everywhere, they're not 24 hours a day."