Their final seconds on tape

Before resting their case, prosecutors play a video taken from limousine's dashboard that captures sounds, sights of collision that killed 2

BY ANN GIVENS | Newsday Staff Writer

October 4, 2006

The glare of oncoming headlights and the explosion of crashing metal were the last things limo driver Stanley Rabinowitz saw and heard before he died, prosecutors said. They were also the last things a Nassau jury saw and heard before prosecutors rested their case in Martin Heidgen's murder trial yesterday.

Prosecutors played a video taken from the dashboard of the limousine Heidgen hit on the night in July last year that he drove the wrong way on the Meadowbrook Parkway. According to the prosecutor, Heidgen was drunk, with more than 14 drinks in his system.

The video begins with a view of the parkway with a light in the distance. That light then rushes toward the camera, coming into focus as Heidgen's headlights in the last seconds of the tape. When the vehicles hit, there is a sound like a bomb going off and the painful moan of tires dragging sideways across the pavement.

Heidgen, 25, of Valley Stream, is charged with murder for hitting the limousine, which was returning from a wedding in Bayville. Killed in the crash were Rabinowitz, 59, of Farmingdale, and 7-year-old Katie Flynn of Long Beach, who had served as a flower girl in her aunt's wedding.

"Those five seconds set the agenda for me and my wife for the rest of our lives," said Neil Flynn, Katie's father, who survived the crash with his wife, Jennifer, her parents and their other daughter, Grace, 5. "That smash was my life."

Stanley's son Keith Rabinowitz said it was wrenching to relive his father's last moments.

"I can imagine the terror in his eyes as he tried to swerve out of the way," he said.

In the video, it appears that the limousine is in the left lane, but begins shifting into the center lane just after Heidgen's truck comes into view. Heidgen's truck also appears to veer slightly into the center lane.

Prosecutors have said Heidgen was feeling depressed on the night of the crash, and got drunk and drove fast on the parkway, not caring who he killed. Several witnesses have testified that Heidgen had passed them on the parkway before the crash, and one woman said she honked her horn to alert him to his mistake.

Defense lawyer Stephen LaMagna of Garden City has said Heidgen was not depressed but was merely lost. He said as soon as Heidgen realized that he was driving in the wrong direction, he slowed down.

He has said that while Heidgen may have made mistakes that night, what he did is not murder - a rare charge in drunken driving cases.

Also yesterday, a toxicologist testified that if Heidgen had a lot to drink that night, then his reaction time may have been slower than usual. But he said it should not have slowed his reaction down by more than a couple of minutes - the amount of time prosecutors say Heidgen was driving the wrong way before the crash.

William Closson, who testified for the prosecution, said Heidgen's .28 percent blood-alcohol level probably would have delayed the time it took information to get to his brain.

But LaMagna asked if Heidgen's delay in getting off the parkway might also have been the result of confusion. Closson said it was possible that Heidgen's drinking might have delayed the time it took him to realize his mistake and figure out how to correct it.

After the video, LaMagna began his case yesterday afternoon, calling Heidgen's mother, Margot Aponte, to testify. She testified that her son didn't pay rent and had just inherited $20,000 from his grandmother, evidence that contradicts prosecutors' theory that Heidgen was depressed in part about financial woes. Aponte also said her son encouraged her recent remarriage. Prosecutors have said Heidgen did not like his new stepfather and was upset about the union.

During cross-examination prosecutor Maureen McCormick suggested that a mother would do anything for her son. Aponte agreed.

Timeline

Stills from the camera mounted in Stanley Rabinowitz's limousine depict the seconds before the crash with Martin Heidgen's pickup.

03:00 seconds to impact

Heidgen's headlights are visible on the other side of the Babylon Turnpike overpass.

01:25

Heidgen's pickup straddles the center and left lanes as he goes under the overpass.

00:25

Just before impact, Rabinowitz's limo veers from the left lane to the center. Heidgen's pickup does the same.

00:00

Impact. Video runs for 10 more seconds then stops.

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Their final seconds on tape

Before resting their case, prosecutors play a video taken from limousine's dashboard that captures sounds, sights of collision that killed 2

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