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Amandeep Singh, 36, of Roslyn, pleaded guilty to aggravated vehicular homicide and related charges in Nassau County Court on Friday, Jan. 3.
Singh admitted that he was speeding, intoxicated, and high on cocaine when he crashed his pickup truck head-on into a car with four teenagers on North Broadway in Jericho on the night of May 3, 2023.
The crash killed Ethan Falkowitz and Drew Hassenbein, both 14. Two other teens suffered serious injuries, including a concussion, a leg injury, and shards of glass that needed to be removed from one of the victim’s eyes.
Ethan and Drew were students at Roslyn Middle School and members of the Roslyn High School Tennis Team, as Daily Voice previously reported. The teens had been celebrating a tennis match victory at a local restaurant earlier that evening, according to prosecutors.
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Singh fled the scene but was found by Nassau County police hiding near a dumpster in a nearby shopping center. A blood test taken hours after the crash revealed a blood alcohol level of .15% and the presence of cocaine.
Moments before the crash, Singh had been driving 95 miles per hour, prosecutors said. An analysis of the event data recorder in his vehicle showed he was going 75 miles per hour in a 40 mile-per-hour zone at the time of impact.
“Throughout this prosecution my position was clear. Nothing short of the maximum prison sentence for the top count charged would be enough to hold this defendant accountable for the total devastation he caused the Hassenbein and Falkowitz families and their entire Roslyn community,” said Nassau County DA Anne Donnelly.
“The evidence of this defendant’s guilt was overwhelming and left him with no choice but to finally take responsibility today for the lives he destroyed.”
In court Friday, Singh pleaded guilty to the following counts:
- Aggravated vehicular homicide
- Two counts of second-degree manslaughter
- Driving while ability impaired by combined influence of alcohol and a drug
- Driving while intoxicated
- Four counts of assault
- Leaving the scene of an incident without reporting
He is expected to be sentenced to eight 25 years in prison when he’s sentenced in February.
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