Wednesday’s Headlines: Terror in the Courtroom Edition

Beloved PS 110 teacher Matthew Jensen was killed by a driver on McGuinness Boulevard in May, 2021. File photo: Gersh Kuntzman
Beloved PS 110 teacher Matthew Jensen was killed by a driver on McGuinness Boulevard in May, 2021. File photo: Gersh Kuntzman

Two homicidal villains who mowed down victims with cars will be sentenced today.

In Manhattan, Sayfullo Saipov, who killed eight people with a truck on the Hudson River Greenway in 2017, is facing multiple life sentences for the terror attack, the Daily News reported. In Brooklyn, Tariq Witherspoon will be sentenced to what is expected to be less than a year in prison for the hit-and-run killing of beloved Williamsburg teacher Matthew Jensen, who would have turned 60 this week.

Witherspoon has pleaded guilty to the top count of criminally negligent homicide, but friends of Jensen will be on hand in Danny Chun’s courtroom to make sure the jurist appreciates the gravity of the situation. Streetsblog will be there, too.

Also on the agenda today is a presser featuring Transportation Alternatives, Open Plans, Los Deliveristas Unidos, United Parcel Service and other groups demanding better and wider bike lanes to handle the increasingly popular e-bikes and e-scooters. We did a bit of a preview here.

In other news:

  • Harlem political legend Bill Perkins has died (Patch). In opposition to all the lavish coverage the former Council member and State Senator is receiving, we’ll always remember him as the person who wanted to deny high-quality bus service to residents of his district, not that we like to speak ill of the dead.
  • Speaking of Harlem, Council Member Kristen Richardson-Jordan has decided not to run for re-election, after supposed attacks from the “Democratic machine” and the media. (amNY, NY Post, City and State, NY Times, Gothamist)
  • The new turnstiles are here! The new turnstiles are here! (Not that the MTA will confirm that, though.) (NY Post)
  • And Chris Christie thinks he’s running for president? The guy can’t even keep a clean driving record! (NJ Globe)
  • The hospital worker caught in that viral video stealing a Citi Bike from a teenager is now on leave. (NY Post)
  • A corrections officer allegedly pulled a gun on another driver in a fight over a parking space. (NYDN)
  • Finally, residents of a fancy Astoria building are still cutting off public access to public space:

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