LI CRIME BRIEFS

BETHPAGE / Trucker indicted in crash that killed girl, mother

A trucker who police said drove his rig through a Bethpage red light last year, killing an 11-year-old girl and her mother, has been indicted by a grand jury on criminally negligent homicide charges.

Ryan Draper, 33, of upstate Lowville, pleaded not guilty Friday after he was arrested upstate and brought to Nassau County on a grand jury warrant. His lawyer, Joseph LoPiccolo of Garden City, said he expected his client to post bail.

Draper is accused of causing the crash last April at Hicksville Road and Central Avenue that killed Barbara Ryan, 44, and her daughter Joanna, both of Bethpage, as they rode in their 2006 Pontiac. Prosecutors had waited to present the case to a grand jury until their experts finished accident reconstruction work on it.

"It's a very unfortunate incident," LoPiccolo said Tuesday. "Whether it's a traffic accident or a crime is for a jury to determine." Police said at the time that Draper passed a breath analyzer test.

The chain-reaction crash during evening rush hour involved three other vehicles, police said.

A woman, 71, driving a 1998 Lincoln Town Car, and a man, 23, driving a 1998 Honda, were slightly injured in the crash, police said at the time. Another driver, in a Mitsubishi, was not injured, police said.

In addition to two counts of criminally negligent homicide, Draper is charged with third-degree assault and reckless driving, both of which are misdemeanors.

-- ANN GIVENS

ROSLYN HEIGHTS / Cops: Mom, son escape blaze sparked by cigarette

A man smoking in his attic in Roslyn Heights sparked a fire that caused extensive damage after he "carelessly disposed" of the cigarette early Tuesday, Nassau police said.

The man, 25, and his mother, 54, escaped the house on St. Marks Place unharmed, police said. They were not identified.

Police said the fire was reported at 1:12 a.m. after the woman smelled smoke and discovered the house was ablaze. She woke her son and the two fled before firefighters arrived, police said.

An investigation by the Nassau fire marshal's office determined the fire started "when the son carelessly disposed of a cigarette in the attic of the home," police said Tuesday.

-- JOHN VALENTI

EAST QUOGUE / 2 charged with robbery, attack with baseball bat

Two East End men were arrested Monday, a day after, police said, they attacked a man with a baseball bat and robbed him of $275 in East Quogue.

Southampton Town police said the incident occurred early Sunday and said the victim, who suffered serious injuries after being struck in the head with the bat, had been taken to Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead. His condition was unknown.

Police said an investigation led them to arrest Ricardo Appling, 25, of East Quogue, and Oleg S. Suleymanov, 22, of Hampton Bays, on Monday.

The two were charged with first-degree robbery and first-degree assault, police said. In addition, police said, Suleymanov was charged with third-degree and fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon. Arraignment details were not available.

-- JOHN VALENTI