A chilling video captured the moment a school bus mowed down a 15-yaer-old girl leaving her dead on a Brooklyn street, police said. The driver of the bus fled the scene by the time police arrived. However, he was later arrested. The New York Police Department identified the girl as Antonina Zatulovska.
The bus driver, Aleksandr Patlakh, a 55-year-old man, has been charged with failing to yield to a pedestrian and failing to use due care. It wasn't immediately clear who owns the bus. The city Education Department said none of its buses were on the road, as schools were closed for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday.
Spine-Chilling Moment
The shocking 20-second clip shows a yellow bus turning the corner at Bedford Avenue and Avenue P in Sheepshead Bay on Monday morning. Zatulovska was just crossing the street when the bus knocks her down, with the rear wheel rolling over the teen, the footage shows. Zatulovska immediately collapses on the ground.
Patlakh, who was at the wheels, then without even caring drives away with the bus. Police received a call moments later and responded just after 8 am. However, by the time officers reached the scene Zatulovska, a Coney Island resident and student at James Madison High School, was already dead.
The high school is located at that intersection, although it was closed at the time for Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Police later tracked Patlakh, also of Coney Island, and arrested him from Neptune Avenue and West Sixth Street, which is about half a mile from his home.
Gone Too Soon
It is not known if Patlakh ran away with the bus to avoid arrest or he just continued driving without realizing that he had mowed down Zatolovska. However, he was arrested but then released on a desk-appearance ticket.
The girl's father, Boris Zatulovksa, 63, described her as "a beautiful girl, innocent, crossing a crosswalk." She has two half-brothers in their 30s from her father's previous marriage, he said.
"Everybody's crying right now," he said. "Everybody knew her spark, her smile.
"My wife is doing pretty bad. Everybody's suffering right now. You couldn't believe it."
Interestingly, the girl's father himself is an Uber driver and said that he knows the area well and "can't imagine that people drive like this in New York. "People can't drive like this in the city, a school area, making this turn," he said. "He killed my daughter in one second. ... Everybody knows you have to slow [down] by a school. You can't make people have to jump out of the way."
Police have launched an investigation into the incident and further details are yet to be shared by authorities.
