Police arrested a 54-year-old man Tuesday after they said he didn’t stay at the scene after hitting a pedestrian on Hollywood Beach in the early morning hours of New Year’s Day. They said doctors later pronounced the victim dead.
According to a report from the Hollywood Police Department, GP was driving a Ram 1500 pickup truck along North Ocean Drive near Nebraska Street when the pedestrian tried crossing outside of a crosswalk just before 2:30 that morning.
Traffic had been swerving to avoid the pedestrian, whose name was redacted from the report, police said.
Authorities said Portuondo “briefly stopped” but then continued driving southbound on Ocean Drive. They said another driver followed him and snapped a picture of his license plate.
The pedestrian suffered multiple serious injuries and was taken to Memorial Regional Hospital, where he was pronounced dead about an hour after the crash. Authorities said they found debris at the crash scene and a blood spatter along the street lamp and sidewalk, including a headlight lens.
Surveillance video showed that P “perceived a hazard by applying the brakes prior to impact and took action in an attempt to evade the situation and then applied the brakes again after the impact which is indicative (that he) knew (he) made impact with an object,” the report states.
Authorities said a time-distance calculation showed he was driving between 46 and 53 mph at the time; the speed limit on North Ocean Drive is 35 mph.
Soon after the crash, Hollywood police said they went to P’s home in the 1900 block of Taft Street — in the city’s Royal Poinciana neighborhood — to look for the truck and found it parked outside of his apartment.
“The vehicle had front passenger side damage to the headlight, fender and hood consistent with impact from a pedestrian,” HPD Officer SC wrote in the report. “In addition, there was bodily fluid along the passenger side mirror and remnants of skin within the broken headlight and fender.”
The lens found at the scene was also a match, police said.
Authorities said they interviewed P, who claimed he had been hit by another vehicle while he picked up a friend named “D” at Capone’s Flicker Lite, but didn’t report the crash or check for damage.
Police said they were able to identify “D” after Portuondo gave them his phone number. “D” denied knowing P and video at the business had no record of him being there that night and employees confirmed no one by that name worked there, the report states.
The report states that cellphone records put P at the scene of the wreck.
As of Wednesday, he was being held without bond in the Broward Main Jail on a charge of leaving the scene of a crash involving death.
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Source: local10
