Crime scene report

NEW YORK – A van driver who plowed onto a bustling sidewalk near the Empire State Building, killing a pregnant woman and seriously hurting another woman, was charged Saturday with manslaughter and assault, prosecutors said.

Some witnesses said the driver, Keston Brown, and a passenger had been moving slowly alongside the women, catcalling them, in the moments before the van lurched forward and slammed into a building.

Brown, of the Bronx, was jailed without bail following Saturday’s arraignment, which relatives of the victims attended. He did not enter a plea, and his attorney didn’t immediately return a telephone message seeking comment.

Brown, 27, is due back in court April 2. Prosecutors didn’t say how much prison time he’d face if convicted.

The Friday wreck killed Ysemny Ramos, a 29-year-old mother of two from Brooklyn. Relatives said she had a third child on the way. She had been headed home to celebrate her third wedding anniversary.

“She was full of love,” her distraught husband, Renaldo Ramos, told the New York Post. “She refused to see the glass half-empty, and she always filled up my cup when I saw it half-empty.”

The accident happened at about 5 p.m. in midtown Manhattan a few blocks from the Empire State Building.

A 37-year-old woman, one of Ramos’ co-workers at a building consulting firm, was hospitalized in serious condition.

The crash was one of two bad ones Friday involving vehicles that hopped curbs.

An hour earlier on the Upper West Side, seven people were injured when a taxi hurtled into a pizzeria, shattering its windows. That wreck left one person in critical condition and two others in stable condition, fire department officials said. There were no arrests.

Frances Rivera was at the pizzeria counter with her daughters when the plate glass windows exploded.

“My kids flew from the impact,” she said.

Her 8-year-old, Tianna Rivera, was among four people with minor injuries, cut by flying glass when the yellow sport utility vehicle hit Mama’s Pizzeria. Her 4-year-old was unharmed.

PHOENIX – The main suspect in the Phoenix Serial Shooter attacks was sentenced to death Friday for six murders that put the city on edge for nearly two years. Dale Hausner was convicted earlier this month of killing six people and attacking 19 others in random nighttime shootings in 2005 and 2006.

As the jury’s decisions were announced, Hausner was expressionless, keeping his head down as he flipped through papers in front of him. Before being led out of the courtroom, Hausner thanked the judge who presided over his trial.

Hausner’s mother was whisked out of the courtroom through a back door by one of his lawyers. One of the attorneys, Tim Agan, wouldn’t comment on the six death sentences.

Hausner, 36, apologized to the families of the victims on Thursday and said he would take his punishment “like a man” if it helps them heal. He declined the opportunity to call his own witnesses and instructed his attorneys not to ask jurors for leniency on his behalf.

He is scheduled to be sentenced Monday on 74 other convictions.

Prosecutors said Hausner preyed on pedestrians, bicyclists, dogs and horses during a 14-month conspiracy that occasionally included his brother and his former roommate, Sam Dieteman.

The Serial Shooter attacks and an unrelated serial killer case kept police and neighborhood watch groups on high alert in the summer of 2006. Families stayed inside as police searched for the killers. Authorities called meetings that drew hundreds of people.

Police said their big break came when one of Dieteman’s drinking buddies, Ron Horton, called them to say Dieteman had bragged about shooting people.

“They called it ‘RV’ing.’ Random Recreational Violence,” Horton told The Associated Press in a 2006 interview. Horton died last year.

Dieteman pleaded guilty to two of the killings and is awaiting sentencing. He testified against Hausner, saying he and his roommate cruised around late at night looking for strangers to shoot. He could also face the death penalty.

LOS ANGELES – A man who police say had guns, duct tape and love letters in his car when he tried to jump a security fence in an attempt to meet “Dancing With the Stars” contestant Shawn Johnson pleaded not guilty Thursday to stalking and other charges.

Robert O’Ryan was arrested Tuesday at the studio where the ABC show is produced. Authorities say they found loaded guns, duct tape and love letters in a car he drove from Florida to meet Johnson, a 17-year-old Olympic gymnast.

The 34-year-old O’Ryan was charged Thursday with one felony count of stalking and two misdemeanor counts of carrying a loaded gun in a vehicle. Wearing a red shirt and khaki pants, with long brown hair to his waist and a beard, O’Ryan tried to hide behind his attorney as he was arraigned in Los Angeles Superior Court.

His bail was raised from $35,000 to $220,000, and a trial date of April 27 was set.

Public defender Dwight Corum represented him in court, though records did not indicate whether he had been assigned a lawyer beyond Thursday.

A restraining order requested by Johnson’s parents said she was “in fear of her life” and was issued Wednesday against O’Ryan. A statement by Johnson’s mother, Teri, states that she was told by police that O’Ryan believed he was meant to have a child with her daughter.

If convicted, O’Ryan could face up to four years in prison.

Johnson, of West Des Moines, Iowa, won one gold and three silver medals at the Beijing Olympics and is one of the remaining celebrity contestants on ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars.”

“Shawn is 17, but she is mature and is feeling very comfortable and confident because she feels that everyone has handled this matter quickly and efficiently across the board,” Johnson’s attorney, Phillip Cohen, said after the arraignment. He said she is back at practice on “Dancing With the Stars.”

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Associated Press Writer Lorinda Toledo contributed to this report.

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. – A suspect in a January back robbery, who police say crashed his getaway car and fled by bus and taxi, appeared in court to face a federal charge.

The day of the heist, David Maksimik finally made it home, only to find his roommate dead, say authorities, who were alerted to his whereabouts when he called 911.

Maksimik, 59, of Stamford, was taken before a federal magistrate in Bridgeport on Tuesday to face a robbery charge. He’s already accused of robbery and several other crimes in state court for the same incident.

The series of events began the morning of Jan. 29, when police say Maksimik made off with about $3,700 from a branch of People’s United Bank in Darien after showing a teller a gun and a fake grenade strapped to his waist.

Maksimik sped away in his 1992 Toyota but struck another vehicle and ditched his car in Norwalk, Darien police said. He made it back to his apartment in Stamford by bus, taxi and a ride from his sister, police said.

But once home, he found his roommate dead of an apparent suicide and called 911. Stamford police, who had been given a description of the bank robber, responded to Maksimik’s house, saw that he matched the description and found the money.

“Everything just came together,” Darien police Capt. Fred Komm said Wednesday. “It’s rare that you solve a bank robbery in such a timely manner. We got lucky, and he was having a bad day.”

Tom Carson, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office, declined to say why federal prosecutors are bringing their own case against Maksimik. It was not immediately clear whether state officials will drop their case because of the federal prosecution.

A message was left for Maksimik’s lawyer.

Maksimik is being held without bail. The federal robbery charge carries up to 20 years in prison.