The son of an NYPD cop killed in a car accident on the Queensboro Bridge exit ramp has filed notice of a $20 million lawsuit alleging city officials knew the notorious curve was a deadly hazard.
Police Officer Elisa Toro was crushed to death after her vehicle overturned and plowed into a storefront on Queens Plaza South on December 10.
Toro, 36, had lost control of the Ford Focus when she struck a metal guardrail on the driver’s side, veered right over a plastic barrier and struck a concrete barrier, causing the vehicle to flip over, according to the NYPD accident report.
Toro was assigned to the 17th Precinct in Midtown, and was driving home from a police Christmas party when the accident occurred about 2 a.m.
In 2011, a motorist and a pedestrian were killed there within a two-week span after vehicles lost control at the exit ramp.
“This was the third fatality at this very dangerous and deadly location created by the city Department of Transportation when the plaza was redesigned to create a bike lane,” said lawyer Sanford Rubenstein, who is drafting a negligence lawsuit.
“This family is entitled to damages for the wrongful death of this police officer,” Rubenstein added.
Toro’s son Ricardo Paredes told the Daily News that he recently visited the scene with a friend for the first time since his mother’s death.
“I saw the ramp, and I could picture exactly how it happened,” said Paredes, 19. “After a couple of accidents, you would think they’d (the city) fix it.”
Paredes said he spoke to his mother on the phone several hours before she died. “The last thing she said to me was, ‘I love you,’ and I said it back to her,” he recalled.
Toro also left behind an 11-year-old daughter, Alyssa Toro.
Two weeks after Toro was killed, city transportation officials curtailed traffic from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. on the bridge’s single outer lane. Officials theorized that since there is not much traffic on the single lane at night, drivers have a tendency to speed.
A city Law Department spokesman said the suit will be reviewed.
