Jury says drunken driver is a murderer

Published 9:00 pm Wednesday, October 18, 2006

MINEOLA, N.Y. – When Martin Heidgen drove into oncoming traffic after a night of heavy drinking, drivers flashed their headlights and honked their horns to warn him, prosecutors said.

When the 25-year-old continued, hitting a wedding limousine and killing a chauffeur and a 7-year-old flower girl, he showed a “depraved indifference to human life” that qualified his actions as murder, jurors ruled Tuesday.

The murder verdict – rare in cases stemming from fatal crashes caused by intoxicated drivers – followed a gut-wrenching, five-week trial filled with gruesome images and testimony.

Jennifer Flynn, who testified about holding daughter Katie’s decapitated head immediately after the wreck, collapsed sobbing into her weeping husband’s arms when the verdict was read.

Limo driver Stanley Rabinowitz, 59, was the second victim.

Jurors saw a horrifying video from the limo’s surveillance camera that showed Heidgen’s pickup truck barreling toward the car moments before the head-on crash. It ended with the metal-on-metal crunch of the two vehicles colliding.

The crash occurred in July 2005 as the family was returning home from a wedding.

Prosecutors will ask for the maximum of 25 years to life at the Nov. 20 sentencing for Heidgen, who stood stoically beside his attorneys through the verdict. Jurors could have convicted him on the lesser charge of second-degree manslaughter, which carries up to 15 years in prison.

Juror Michael DeRita said deliberations became “pretty fierce,” but ultimately jurors agreed unanimously on the murder charge.