Infant Girl, Mother Injured When Car Crashes Into Yonkers Store
YONKERS, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) - A mother and her baby were seriously hurt Friday when an out of control car crashed through a storefront in Yonkers.
The car bent metal and broke glass as it crashed inside a now boarded up barbershop, CBS2's Dave Carlin reported.
Surveillance video shows the car haphazardly rounding onto Lake Avenue from Morningside Place around 9:30 a.m. Friday, then hitting a parked car and spinning into the path of the woman crossing the street with her baby girl in her arms.
"She saw that she was going to get hit and she was trying to run out of the way, but the car was going too fast," said Flemming Hudson, the manager at a nearby Foodtown.
As the car slammed through the front of John's Barbershop, the mother, 36, and her 8-month-old girl were violently pushed from the street to the shop's interior.
"The mother was here outside and she went through with the car," said the barbershop's owner Dimitry Babayev, who suffered a minor cut.
Babayev recognized the woman who was injured because she works next door at Bagel Land.
"She didn't work today. She had her day off and then her and her husband, they're going to, I think, Atlantic City. Like, they had a date with her family and then this thing happened," said Joana Tinajero, a coworker.
Tinajero said two police officers were in the bagel shop and immediately ran over to the barbershop.
Their body-worn cameras captured the chaos and drama inside the barbershop and the desperate attempt to reach the 8-month-old baby pinned under the car.
"Grab the baby, grab the baby. Come on, come on. I got it, I got it," one officer can be heard saying.
"We realized the car couldn't be moved, so we had to get the car off the baby," Yonkers Police Officer Paul Samoyedny told CBS2's Tony Aiello.
Samoyedny was with his partner, Rocco Fusco, who made like an Olympian, lifting up the car.
"The effort he put into lifting up that car, unbelievable. Really proud of Rocco," he said.
Samoyedny moved debris and dropped to the ground to reach the 8-month-old, who was injured and covered in motor oil.
"Get her out as fast as possible. I was just happy that she was moving underneath there," she said.
"They were just dialed in, just professionalism at its best. They were dialed in about just making sure they can get the car up, get the baby out and get her to safety and get her to an ambulance," Yonkers Police Commissioner John Mueller said.
Cops found a cold open beer in the car.
The driver was identified by police as David Poncurak. Investigators said he was given a field sobriety test and consented to blood tests.
He's charged with driving under the influence and vehicular assault.
"I'm just happy mom and child are OK," Samoyedny said.
Samoyedny is a father of four, and his children were on his mind as he pulled the baby to safety.
"You can't help but think about them. We always talk about at work, guys that don't have kids, when situations like this happen, they don't know how it kind of hits you a little harder," he said.
The mother suffered a compound fracture to her leg. The child suffered a fractured skull, authorities said. Both are expected to survive.
CBS2's Dave Carlin contributed to this report.