Two men killed by delivery truck on Upper East Side, police say
A Baldor’s delivery driver accidentally knocked his parked truck into gear and dragged two men to their deaths on the Upper East Side on Friday morning, according to police, sources and witnesses.
“The gas stuck, the gas stuck! I just hit two people!” the 66-year-old driver screamed before making a frantic 911 call during the Christmas Eve horror, a police source told The Post.
One of the victims, Taurino Rosendo Morales, 37, was on a bike and the other Delfino Eduardo Maceda, 46, was walking at East 61st Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan when the truck — which has racked up 271 traffic violations in the past two years — hit them around 9:20 a.m., according to police and records.
“While [the truck driver] was working with his assistant, as he gets back in the truck, his arm accidentally knocks the gearshift, and the truck starts rolling forward and the assistant is yelling, ‘Whoa! Whoa! Stop! Stop!’ ” a law-enforcement source said.
“Thinking he’s jamming his foot on the brake, he misses and steps on the accelerator, running over the delivery guy on the E-bike and then the second pedestrian,” the source said.
“He must be really devastated,” the source added of the driver, a cancer patient who has not been identified by police and was determined by cops not to have been under the influence of alcohol or his medications at the time.
A witness said the truck driver struck a fire hydrant and then hit and dragged the men.
“I was driving on Third Avenue at this same time a truck is coming done 61st,” witness Roy Decosta said. “The truck driver hit the fire hydrant, and he struck the guys on the sidewalk, but then he dragged them.
“He took them in the middle of the street, he said his brakes broke. It all happened so quick, it was really sad.”
Online records show that the license plate on the Baldor truck has been cited for 271 non-moving traffic violations since 2019, including for double-parking and parking in a crosswalk. It is not known which driver or drivers were involved in the violations.
Dramatic video taken by a witness in the aftermath of the incident shows both victims sprawled out on the pavement motionless on their backs across the street from each other.
The footage includes a bystander and then a cop desperately performing CPR on Eduardo Maceda, while onlookers speculate that Rosendo Morales is still breathing.
The biker has a small pool of blood underneath him, while his mangled bike lies several feet away by the curb.
“Oh, my god,” says a man in the footage. “You never know what’s going to happen in life.
“He’s fighting for his life right here on 61st Street,” the witness says, referring to the cyclist, who was later pronounced dead.
The truck driver remained on the scene, cops said.
A representative for the specialty retailer declined comment to The Post on Friday’s tragedy, saying, “We’re not giving out any statements at the moment.”
According to the Baldor Facebook page, the company offers $3,000 signing bonuses for drivers.
