The driver, sending the car into a crowd of passers-by in times square a month earlier and killed one of them and seriously injuring the other, pleaded not guilty.
26-year-old Richard Rojas and pleaded not guilty in the murder of 18-year-old tourist Alice Elsman and hitting 20 other pedestrians. He kept «head up high» through most of the meeting, during which were read by the prosecution. The court was attended by the mother of the murdered girl Jessica Williams. Accompanying her man defiantly showed Rojas middle finger.
Rojas, a veteran of the US Navy, was accused of second-degree murder, attempted murder and assault. The word accused is not granted.
At the request of prosecutors, a resident of the Bronx, Richard Rojas sent his Honda Accord onto the sidewalk on Seventh Avenue, and later admitted that he wanted to «kill them all», referring to the pedestrians in his way. He told authorities that he smoked marijuana before the incident and thought that the police would kill him.
The next hearing is scheduled on October 24.
