Police released bodycam footage of police officers racing to move young students out of the street as the out of control U-Haul driver tore through the neighborhood — possibly heading for right where the children were. NBC New York’s Marc Santia reports.
Newly released bodycam footage from police shows officers frantically race to get school children out of the path of chaos, as a U-Haul driver tore through Brooklyn streets and left trail of destruction in his wake.
The tense moments were captured on an officer's body camera and were released by the NYPD on Tuesday. Listening listening to NYPD choppers as they followed the path of the rampaging U-Haul truck, Lieutenant John Vitale, Officer Hector Santini and Officer Francis Ingebrethsen suddenly realized the truck is four blocks away from Bay Ridge Prep School.
Making matters worse, the officers realize that that the students at the school would be outside for lunch recess around the time the truck was on a collision course towards toward them — putting children, parents and teachers square in harm’s way.
With urgency in their voices, the lieutenant and two officers didn't hesitate as they quickly began moving children off the street, as the kids were busy playing or drawing with sidewalk chalk. The children were escorted into the school as the truck smashed its way through Bay Ridge.
Just moments later, the truck flies by where they were. While the driver, identified as 62-year-old Weng Sor, never turned down the street the kids had been on, parents couldn't help but wonder if the driver didn’t turn simply because he didn’t see anyone in the road he could take out.
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Sor was charged with one count of second-degree murder and seven counts of attempted murder in the attack, which unfolded over a harrowing 48 minutes over a large swath of Brooklyn’s bustling Bay Ridge and Sunset Park neighborhoods. Police eventually pinned the truck against a building after a miles-long chase.
One person was killed and eight people were injured as the U-Haul truck veered onto sidewalks and plowed into bicyclists, moped riders and at least one pedestrian, hitting people at various points along a circuitous route. The truck also rammed a police car, and the officer inside was among the injured.
Although the motive was not totally clear, the NYPD commissioner stated no evidence currently suggests any terrorism involvement in what she called a "violent rampage." Instead, police said Tuesday that the driver was suffering from an apparent mental health crisis and said he started mowing people down after seeing an “invisible object” coming toward him.
Sor, a troubled man with a history of violence and mental illness, told police seeing that "invisible object" set him off, Chief of Detectives James Essig told reporters Tuesday. Sor's family said he'd stopped taking his medication, Essig said.
"He states when he’s driving his van he sees an 'invisible object' come towards the car. At that point, he says, ‘I’ve had enough’ and he goes on his rampage," Essig said. "There was no object."
Sor, who lived in Las Vegas with his mother, came to New York earlier in February after spending time in Florida and was pulled over twice in the U-Haul in the days prior to the attack, police said. He may have been living out of the truck.
He was walked out of a police station in handcuffs, shouting words about "war" and was expected to be arraigned by Wednesday. Court records did not list a lawyer who could comment on his behalf.
A senior law enforcement official told News 4 that Sor said in a statement that he "only ran over bad people — not good people."
A 44-year-old man riding a moped died later on Monday from a head injury after he was hit by the truck roughly a half hour after it struck the first victim. Mayor Eric Adams said the man, who was identified by family as Yije Ye, was a single father “raising those children on his own.”
The victim's cousin told NBC New York that Ye had moved to the U.S. from China nearly two decades ago. He lived in Bay Ridge, according to neighbors, as was delivering food when he was struck. He later died at the hospital.
Yije Ye leaves behind three teenage children, and the family said that the "tragic accident shattered their American Dream."
The scope and length of the destruction led to questions about the NYPD's response and whether the pursuit — which at one point involved a police car speeding after the U-Haul up onto the sidewalk as a man dove to safety — put more people in harm's way.
Mohammed Salah Rakchi, 36, a delivery worker who emigrated from Algeria three years ago, was hit while running errands after dropping his 7-year-old daughter off at school. The first victim hit in the rampage, Rakchi suffered broken bones, brain bleeding and other injuries. He remained in a medically induced coma Tuesday, clinging to life.
"I feel like I am in a dream….the worst kind of dream," said his wife, Nadjet Tchenar, adding that there had been no improvement in her husband's condition since Monday. "My heart is broken."
A lawyer for Rakchi's family, Derek Sells, questioned whether being chased by police "was a triggering event for this driver and what might have led him to do the things that he did." The lawfirm said it would be conducting its own investigation. separate from the law enforcement case.
NYPD policy requires officers to stop chasing vehicles when the risks to police and the public “outweigh the danger to the community.”
Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said Tuesday that the department is reviewing its response. The NYPD later posted body camera video images to social media showing officers urgently clearing a street full of elementary school children near where the U-Haul was wreaking havoc.
After Sor was stopped, Essig said he told police: “You should have shot me," allegedly telling arresting officers he wanted to die.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
