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Mother Catapults to Her Death Off BQE When Drunk Driver Rear-Ends Her: NYPD

By  Trevor Kapp Aidan Gardiner Ben Fractenberg and Nicholas Rizzi | August 29, 2016 8:18am | Updated on August 29, 2016 6:46pm

 Aissatou Diallo, 49, was killed after she was struck by a drunk driver on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway early Monday morning, Aug. 29, 2016.
Aissatou Diallo, 49, was killed after she was struck by a drunk driver on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway early Monday morning, Aug. 29, 2016.
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GREENPOINT — A Staten Island mother fell to her death from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway early Monday when she got out of her car on the side of the road to help a family member and was rear-ended by a drunk driver, police and relatives said.

Aissatou Diallo, 49, was heading home from a family wedding in a 2005 Chevy when her cousin, who was in a different vehicle, called to say they had a flat tire, family members said. The car Diallo was in pulled over to help on the westbound side of the BQE near Meeker Avenue and Apollo Street and she got out about 3 a.m., an NYPD spokesman said.

Vladimir Menin, 43, was driving drunk in a 2011 BMW when he rear-ended the car Diallo had been in, which set off a chain reaction, smacking into her and pushing her off the expressway to the street below, according to police.

 She had gotten out of her car when a vehicle driven by an intoxicated man rear-ended her, police said.
She had gotten out of her car when a vehicle driven by an intoxicated man rear-ended her, police said.
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DNAinfo/Trevor Kapp

Menin was treated at Woodhull Medical Center, where he was listed in stable condition, and was later charged with aggravated vehicular homicide, DWI, reckless driving and driving with a suspended license, police said.

“The guy must have been driving at least 120 miles-per-hour,” Diallo's 16-year-old son, Abdoulaye Diallo, said. “I had to jump out of the way.”

The son, who was in the car with his mother before the collision, said the drunk driver tried to flee the scene but that he chased after him and spit in his face. 

“He’s pathetic,” Abdoulaye said. 

Another witness said he heard the mother's family member yelling after the crash. 

"I heard someone saying, 'My mother!' She was screaming her bloody mind out. It lasted 10 to 12 minutes," said Joseph Bulger, 65, who lives nearby.

"There was a woman laying on the ground. She was sprawled out. There was blood running from her all the way down the street. People were keeping their distance," Bulger added.

Diallo was pronounced dead at Elmhurst Hospital, police said.

“I’m just sad,” Abdoulaye said. “[I want] justice, not revenge.”