Good Samaritan: 2 girls clung to car hood screaming

Stopped at a red light in Carle Place, Steven Lo Verde heard a "big bang." He looked to his left and saw a horrific sight:

Two teenage girls were screaming as they clung to the hood of a Toyota that had just struck them and two others were lying on the pavement, bleeding, he said.

The Toyota sped south from the intersection of Glen Cove and Old Country roads, heading toward Garden City. And Lo Verde, 45, a contractor from upper Brookville, was intent on stopping the car.

He chased the hit-and-run driver during rush hour Wednesday evening for about a mile, Nassau police said Thursday, stopping the driver on Clinton Road at Osborne Road.

The girls, all 16-year-old friends from Herricks High School in New Hyde Park, had been returning from an after-school trip to the Roosevelt Field Mall when they were struck - hit with such force that the impact smashed the windshield, police said.

One girl needed more than 100 stitches to her head, police said. All were taken to hospitals and were expected to survive. Their updated conditions weren't available Thursday night.

Lo Verde pursued the driver and held him until police arrived, authorities said. The crash happened at about 6:10 p.m.

The girls were headed west to catch a bus when the Toyota, driven by Elias Garcia, hurtled through a red light and struck them in the crosswalk where they had the right of way, police said.

Garcia, 26, of Clinton Street, Hempstead, "hit all four of these young ladies with such force that he sent two of them flying onto the sidewalk and the other two were clinging for their lives on the hood of this car," said Nassau Police Third Squad Det. Lt. Raymond Coté.

At that point, "they're screaming," Coté said. "They're on the hood of the car. They're bleeding. Mr. Garcia doesn't stop."

Coté said Garcia at one point came to an abrupt stop "to get them off his car, as you would some debris or a pile of snow off the hood of your car."

Lo Verde, in his own vehicle, chased the Toyota and pulled Garcia out of the car, then held him for police.

Lo Verde said he confronted Garcia. "He kept saying, 'I didn't see them, I didn't see them.'

" 'What do you mean you didn't see them? You just left four girls lying in the street. Tell it to the cops.' "

Through a court-appointed attorney and interpreter, Garcia pleaded not guilty to several misdemeanors, including reckless endangerment and assault.

Judge Tricia M. Ferrell ordered him jailed on $1.5 million bail.

Garcia's wife, Xiomara Lopez, and his brother Carlos attended the hearing. In Spanish, they said that they would not be able to afford his bail.

Lopez and the defendant have a 2-year-old daughter, they said. Lopez said her husband is a house painter and a good and hardworking man. "If he knew that he had hit somebody, he would have stopped," the brother said through a translator.

Elias Garcia didn't stop, police said, because he is in the United States illegally from Guatemala and lacks a driver's license.

Herricks Superintendent John Bierwirth said "People were extremely scared that their [the girls] injuries might be fatal. . . . People are relieved that their worst fears were not confirmed."

With Yamiche Alcindor