Hartford Courant - April 20, 2006

2 Die On Way Home From Work Driver, Passenger Killed When Car Was Struck
By Fleeing Vehicle By Tina A. Brown, Courant Staff Writer

A Hartford man who was driving co-workers home from work early Wednesday was killed along with a female passenger when his car was broadsided at a city intersection by a car fleeing from a police stop.

Two passengers in the second vehicle were critically injured.

The fatal collision occurred just before 1 a.m. at Washington and Jefferson streets in the Frog Hollow section of Hartford.

Police say officers were responding to a call that gunshots were fired from a white Mitsubishi on Broad Street near Ward Street about 12:45 a.m.

Police Sgt. Densil Samuda spotted a youth driving a white Mitsubishi on Lincoln Street, some three blocks south. Samuda pulled over the car and got out of his cruiser with his gun drawn. He instructed the driver to "shut off the engine" and told the two passengers to "show your hands," when the driver suddenly sped off, Hartford Police Chief Patrick J. Harnett said.

The Mitsubishi, which was traveling with its lights off, turned right onto Jefferson Street, continuing eastbound at a high speed. Samuda ran back to his cruiser and backup officers were called. At the Washington Street intersection, the Mitsubishi collided with a southbound red Taurus, which was traveling through a green light. Police reached the scene after the violent crash, Harnett said.

The driver of the Taurus, whom sources identified as Edilberto Jara, of Hartford, and his rear-seat passenger, Maribel Rojas, of Wethersfield, died in the accident.

Rojas, who had accepted a ride to Wethersfield, was ejected through the rear window. Following the impact, the Taurus jumped the sidewalk and continued into brush before slamming into a pole at the On the Run Mobil gasoline station, destroying several gasoline pricing signs.

Two critically injured passengers in the Mitsubishi were taken to nearby Hartford Hospital, Harnett said. One of the passengers was on life support and the other was listed in critical but stable condition, Harnett said. Their identities were not released, police said, because the two men, believed to be in their late teens or early 20s, were not carrying identification and police were relying on fingerprint data.

The Mitsubishi driver, whom police have not identified, suffered cuts and bruises. He was treated and released and was placed in police custody, Harnett said, but he had not been charged. His status late Wednesday could not be determined.

"He killed two innocent people," Harnett said. Police found a loaded .22-caliber handgun in the front seat of the Mitsubishi, he said.

Jara, a native of Peru who was in his late 20s, had dropped off his brother, Jose, and another co-worker, Fatima Garcia, at the Lafayette Arms Apartments on Washington Street, where Jara and his brother lived. The apartment complex is just a block from the accident scene. Jara and his passengers were returning from a janitorial service job.

Lafayette Arms building superintendent Luis Santiago said Jara lived in the building with his mother and his brother. He was "a nice, hardworking and honest kid," Santiago said. "It's sad."

The Jaras came to Hartford in 1998, Jose Jara said.

An autopsy conducted on Rojas Wednesday showed that she died of multi-traumatic injuries, a spokesman for the office of the chief state medical examiner said. An autopsy had not been done on Jara by Wednesday afternoon.

Detectives in the evidentiary services and accident reconstruction units of the Hartford Police Department are conducting the investigation.

Copyright 2006, Hartford Courant

Hartford Courant April 21, 2006

Grieving Follows Deadly Crash
Families And Friends Mourn Four Victims
By Tina A. Brown And Jeffrey B. Cohen, Courant Staff Writers

The families of two hard-working immigrants returning from their jobs and two youths riding in a car fleeing city police were united by grief Thursday as relatives and friends recalled the lives of loved ones cut short by a violent crash on the streets of Hartford's Frog Hollow neighborhood.

The two-car crash shortly before 1 a.m. Wednesday took the life of a mother of two children, a father of two children, a 15-year-old and a 20-year-old father. Some friends and family members were observed Thursday memorializing their losses at outdoor rituals that are becoming all too common on the city's streets.

The lone survivor of the crash, the man who police said was driving the white Mitsubishi that was fleeing police and ran into a Grand Prix, was arraigned in Superior Court Thursday. James Figueroa, 18, has been charged with first-degree manslaughter and numerous other offenses.

The crash victims included 37-year-old Maribel Rojas, whose 17-year-old autistic son, Luis, had sat all day in the living room of the family's Wethersfield home waiting for his mother to return from work.

Maribel Rojas had caught a ride home early Wednesday morning from a co-worker, Edilberto Jara, a 27-year-old father of two.

As Jara's family sifted through photographs Thursday, they also contemplated how to find the words to tell his daughters, 4-year-old Jasmine and 2-year-old Mya that their Papi wasn't coming home either.

Rojas and Jara were returning from work at CSI International in Windsor Locks, where they cleaned office buildings at Hamilton Standard. Police say Jara had the green light as he was traveling through the intersection at Jefferson and Washington streets when his Grand Prix was broadsided by the white Mitsubishi being driven by Figueroa. That vehicle was being pursued by police after it had been stopped following a report of gunshots fired from a white car on Broad Street.

At his court appearance, Figueroa's face was swollen and he had numerous cuts on his hands and arms, said family members who were there.

Two passengers in the Mitsubishi, 15-year-old Ronique "Chedda" St. Edwards and 20-year-old Dante Rodriguez, both of Hartford, died Wednesday as a result of injuries sustained in the crash.

Figueroa, who was jailed with bail set at $3 million, has been charged with two counts of first-degree manslaughter, carrying weapons in a motor vehicle, operating a motor vehicle under suspension, reckless driving, disobeying a police officer and failing to obey a traffic control signal, police said.

He is expected to be charged with two more counts of manslaughter in connection with the deaths of his passengers.

Maribel Rojas' sister, Denise, was teary when she described how she felt about Figueroa.

"God have mercy on him. He is going to be in pain for the rest of his life," she said. "I would like to see his face one time."

As Rojas' family gathered in her living room in Wethersfield on Thursday, 17-year-old Luis played a video game. Family members described Rojas, a native of the Dominican Republic and the grandmother of a 4-month-old, as a woman with a hearty laugh who loved dancing and playing bingo.

"She was a very hard-working lady. She always had a smile on her face and was always willing to help anybody. She never said no," said Alba Acosta, Rojas' former sister-in-law.

Rojas' daughter, 15-year-old Lismabelle Rojas, said she felt something was wrong early Wednesday morning when her mother didn't arrive home at 1 a.m., the normal time.

"I waited up for her. I called her cellphone," Lismabelle said.

Then, about 4:35 a.m., she said she was summoned to Hartford Hospital, where they told her that her mother, who had come to the United States in 1981 to make a better life for her family, was gone.

If Rojas was recalled for her zest for life, Jara was remembered for providing for his family.

One of nine children, Jara came here from Peru in 1998 to join his family. He worked the night shift cleaning office buildings, and photographs showed how much he enjoyed his family. His wake is scheduled for tonight at the Deleon Funeral Home, following by services on Saturday at St. Peter's Church.

On Franklin Avenue, behind the Fade Away barbershop, "Chedda" St. Edwards was described as a lady's man despite his young age. The 15-year-old attended Bulkeley High School sporadically, said his friend, Ismael Delgado, 19, and lived with his grandmother.

His friends erected a cardboard shrine in Chedda's memory where they wrote notes to his family and left pictures of the good times they once had.

"He could walk down any block in Hartford and people knew him," Delgado said.

By dusk Thursday, a small crowd had gathered outside of the apartment of Dante Rodriguez's mother on Summit Street. A few paces from the wooden palate that held candles and pictures of the 20-year-old Rodriguez, the ground was spray-painted in black: "Da good die young but da great one's [sic] die even earlier."

Barbara Rivera, 21, was Rodriguez's girlfriend and the mother of their 2-year-old son, also named Dante. She and Rodriguez were in bed when he got a call from Figueroa, she said.

"He just said, `I'm going to go downstairs really fast to talk to my friend.' I waited for him to come and he never did," Rivera said. "He called Dante from his sleep to his death."

Rivera, Rodriguez's two sisters, and his mother all agreed that he and Figueroa had rarely spent time together. What's more, they said, Rodriguez was not the sort of guy to run from police. A graduate of Hartford Public High School, he was a front-seat passenger in the Mitsubishi.

.In 2002, Rodriguez - who was a writer for the Hartford youth newspaper Echoes From the Street - won $500 and a framed certificate for an essay on the evils of gun violence.

"Guns are a cowardly way of ending problems," Rodriguez wrote. He won the prize from the Connecticut Collaborative for Education Against Gun Violence.

His family said Rodriguez, originally from Boston, was unemployed but had recently worked at Burger King.

"My brother was full of life," said his sister, Abriela Rodriguez. "He wasn't out to get nobody. He was just out to have fun."

Hartford Courant columnist Helen Ubinas contributed to this story. Copyright 2006, Hartford Courant

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