Woman Arrested in Hit-and-Run Outside Spruce Street School

Families arrive at the Spruce Street School on Beekman Street Thursday morning, just as they did on April 13 when Heather Hensl was struck on the sidewalk near the building by a hit-and-run driver. Tiffany Murdaugh was arrested and charged in the incident. Photo: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib

“I’m beyond relieved and very appreciative that the NYPD did not close the case, but continued to pursue it,” said Heather Hensl, the victim of an alleged hit-and-run driver who was arrested in May, more than a month after she was injured outside the Spruce Street School.

Hensl suffered a double leg fracture and a gash to her forehead.

Tiffany Murdaugh, 34, pleaded not guilty at her arraignment, where she was charged with second-degree assault and first-degree reckless endangerment, both felonies, as well as leaving the scene of an accident without reporting it, a traffic infraction.

The suspect was released on $2,500  bail, with a scheduled court date in August.
Murdaugh allegedly was driving her Dodge Charger on the sidewalk outside the Beekman Street side of the school when she struck Hensl, a physician assistant on her way to work at nearby New York Presbyterian Lower Manhattan Hospital.

The impact, Hensl recalled, caused her to “fly over the driver’s side and land back on the sidewalk. I think I went over the hood.”

By late last month, she remained on crutches, unable to return to work or do much of her usual caring for two daughters, ages three and six.

Witnesses and the DA’s office say the car narrowly missed a mother with her two young children on their way to school.

The accident amplified what already was concern at the school regarding safety on Beekman Street, where construction has narrowed the street to one lane, causing some drivers to partially park on the sidewalk. Witnesses said the car Murdaugh was allegedly driving went onto the sidewalk between a parked car and the building in an effort to get ahead of stalled traffic. Based on a surveillance video of the incident, the DA alleges that Mur­daugh hit the victim at 20 to 25 miles an hour and continued on “at the same rate of speed.”

As time passed following the accident, Hensl and parents at the school grew frustrated over what appeared to be a delay an arrest, despite what the NYPD said was a positive identification of the car and its owner.

Hensl said she had been told by police that an arrest was made more difficult because the car’s owner, whose name had not been released until later, lived in New Jersey. The lack of a witness who could identify the driver was also a problem, police said.

“I figured that if the car was identified, why wouldn’t the owner of the car have to answer some questions, even if she loaned the car to somebody or wants to say it got stolen, or whatever the case may be, I think they have to be held accountable,” Hensl told the Trib in an interview, just one day before Murdaugh’s arrest.

In the NYPD’s first public account of the arrest, Capt. Mark Iocco, the 1st Precinct’s commanding officer, told the precinct’s Community Council late last month that, after finally managing to contact Murdaugh by email, detectives convinced her to come in and answer questions as part of their investigation of an insurance claim she had filed over damage to her car in the incident.

Iocco said Murdaugh implicated herself in the crime by telling them that she was the sole driver of the car that day.

“Then we didn’t need the positive ID and she was arrested,” Iocco said.

According to Iocco, the suspect did not admit to the offense but “she made a verbal statement that she was smoking marijuana maybe and maybe she blacked out. She was confused.”

Murdaugh’s Legal Aid lawyer, La­mar Miller, did not return a call for comment.

In a video interview with the Trib at her home, one day before the arrest of Tiffany Murdaugh, Heather Hensl talks about the hit-and-run incident and its impact on her life.