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Unlicensed Driver Arrested After Fatally Striking Elderly Man, NYPD Says

By  Trevor Kapp and Aidan Gardiner | August 8, 2017 7:48am 

 The man was crossing at the intersection when the truck hit him Tuesday morning, police said.
The man was crossing at the intersection when the truck hit him Tuesday morning, police said.
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DNAinfo/Trevor Kapp

CHELSEA — A 73-year-old man was trying to cross the street at a Seventh Avenue intersection when a driver whose license was suspended for 26 years fatally struck him with a tractor-trailer Tuesday morning, police said.

The man, whose name wasn't immediately released, was trying to cross at the corner of Seventh Avenue and West 25th Street about 5:45 a.m. when Sydney Jones hit him with a Penske truck en route to a drop off at Whole Foods, police and colleagues said.

It wasn't immediately clear if the pedestrian had the light or if he was in the crosswalk.

He was pronounced dead at Bellevue Hospital, police said.

Jones, of Hillside, New Jersey, was arrested at the scene for driving with a license that was suspended in New York, police said. He was later released with a desk appearance ticket, police said Wednesday.

Jones' New Jersey commercial driver's license was suspended in New York on April 25, 1991, when he failed to answer a summons in Orange County, according to a New York DMV spokesman.

He was convicted here in December 2002 for driving a large vehicle that May in Seneca County, the spokesman said. He paid $200 for that infraction, officials said.

Jones' license, which he's had since at least 1985, is currently valid in New Jersey, though it has been suspended three times since 1991, according to Brian Ahrens, spokesman for New Jersey's Motor Vehicle Commission.

Jones' suspensions were for being caught twice without insurance and once for a parking offense, according to Ahrens, who didn't have further information.

Police said their investigation into the Tuesday incident continues.

Jones' truck had Indiana plates, but the trailer was from New Jersey.

Some colleagues of Jones showed up at the scene and said he was making a drop off at Whole Foods, but declined to comment further.

It wasn't immediately clear what company Jones was working for.