The suspected drunken driver within the lethal July Fourth social gathering horror on the Decrease East Facet has an extended legal report — together with an unhinged assault on an habit counseling trainee and an “working whereas intoxicated” bust close to a Wisconsin metropolis the place a madman plowed an SUV by means of a Christmas parade.
Violence and booze-fueled mayhem swirled round Daniel Christopher Hyden, 44, lengthy earlier than police mentioned he rammed a pickup truck right into a crowded park Thursday evening, killing three and leaving eight injured, in line with courtroom information, regulation enforcement sources and his personal writing.
Atiba Boyce, 41, instructed The Submit that Hyden — his teacher at an East Harlem substance abuse counseling faculty — blew up and threw a chair at him throughout a category in February.
“I by no means actually smelled alcohol on his breath when he was instructing, however one thing was off, I don’t know what it was,” Boyce mentioned Friday, noting he didn’t discover it far-fetched that Hyden was the suspect within the deadly crash.
“He was very aggressive.”
Cops charged Hyden with assault and harassment for the Feb. 29 incident, law-enforcement sources mentioned.
The NYPD additionally had two different previous run-ins with Hyden, each assault circumstances from January 2020 and October 2022 which have since been sealed, in line with the sources.
Hyden, a substance abuse counselor and self-described “ex-professional addict,” publicly didn’t draw back from his struggles with habit.
He labored a number of positions the place he mentored different addicts throughout town, from Montefiore to Lincoln Hospital to a non-profit known as Companies for UnderServed, along with penning a e book titled “The Sober Addict” wherein he alluded to quite a few brushes with the regulation.
“I’ve taken many mugshots through the years and may actually say I’ve an interesting gallery of embarrassing photos that present habit’s debilitating results,” he wrote.
“Like many with my illness, my encounters with regulation enforcement and incarceration have been attributed to my use and abuse.”
One such authorized dustup unfolded in Wisconsin throughout 2015, when an area police officer seen Hyden driving with out his lights on, in line with courtroom information obtained by The Submit.
Hyden instructed the cop he had been driving from an Octoberfest celebration in Milwaukee, the place he “simply had one ‘stein’ of beer,” the information state.
The cop, nonetheless, famous Hyden spoke with slurred speech and reeked of beer, in line with the information. His blood-alcohol content material examined at 0.13%, over the authorized restrict of 0.08% in Wisconsin, the information state.
A glass stein with 3 inches of beer was present in Hyden’s automobile, information state.
The arrest unfolded close to Waukeska, the place a crazed man named Darrell Brooks in 2021 plowed an SUV by means of a Christmas parade, leaving six individuals useless and greater than 60 injured — a vacation horror with an eerie, although inexact, parallel to the Independence Day carnage linked to Hyden.
The Wisconsin courtroom information state Hyden had two drunken driving convictions in New Jersey throughout 2006 and 2011.
Hyden finally pleaded responsible to a third-offense drunken driving cost in Wisconsin, for which he acquired 130-day sentence, information state.
Susan Opper, district lawyer for Waukesha County, mentioned she was sorry to listen to concerning the lethal Decrease East Facet incident.
“Right here in Waukesha, we are able to definitely admire the ache and struggling of all impacted when a motorcar is used as a weapon towards harmless individuals attempting to get pleasure from a vacation gathering,” she mentioned in a press release.
“If the allegation is true that the motive force was impaired on the time of the occasions, we’re outraged and hope he will likely be held totally accountable.”
Hyden’s most up-to-date run-in with the regulation, earlier than the crash, was the February combat with Boyce on the East Harlem vocational faculty, police mentioned.
Boyce mentioned the dust-up unfolded after he complained to a supervisor at Recoveries R Us about Hyden’s condescending and antagonistic habits.
He mentioned Hyden threatened him, squared up for a combat and attacked him.
“We tussled for a little bit bit,” Boyce mentioned.
A consultant for Recoveries R Us, the place the incident unfolded, instructed The Submit they couldn’t touch upon Hyden or the crash, citing an open investigation into the February assault case.
Hyden had punched Boyce within the eye and confronted an assault cost, sources mentioned.
The Manhattan District Lawyer’s Workplace didn’t return a request for data Friday concerning the standing of the case.
Boyce instructed The Submit he wished prosecutors to pursue anger administration therapy or group service towards Hyden.
“I wished him to take care of his feelings as a result of what I mentioned shouldn’t have triggered him to reply the way in which he did,” he mentioned.
“It simply looks as if there was one thing beneath that.”
Extra reporting by Megan Palin
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