BRIDGEPORT -- A 63-year-old Bridgeport woman has been identified as the person killed when her car was broadsided by man trying to elude police Thursday afternoon.
Susan Tomczyk lived only several homes from the intersection in which she was killed by a car driven by Joseph Guzman-Rivera, 21, of Bridgeport, who was stopped moments before by a state trooper on I-95 he did not have a license plate on the car he was driving. When Guzman-Rivera had stopped in a travel lane, the trooper instructed him to pull over, into the right breakdown lane.
Instead, he raced off of the highway and onto surface streets in a car that does not belong to him. A short distance later, at the intersection of Railroad Avenue. and Iranistan Avenue, he crashed into Tomczyk's Toyota and then caromed into two pedestrians, who sustained serious, but not life threatening injuries.
Both Connecticut State Police and Bridgeport Police insist they never chased the car the suspect was driving. Moments after 1 p.m., accident, a mother and her three children were busy preparing to move out of this three family home, about a block from the collision.
"There's always sirens or something going on," said Monique Blake, of Lewis St. "So, you tend to kind a block it out."
Her two teenage sons were going back-and-forth from the basement.
"We came back out (of the basement) and then the police were just up there asking if anybody was in the basement and we said no," said Julian Blake. "We didn't see anybody. And they (police) tried to take him."
Him meaning his 15-year-old brother, Cristian, who fit the description of Guzman-Rivera.
Meanwhile, the boys' mother was in the house and came rushing outside when she heard police were on site.
"And there's like 25 cop cars, undercover cars," said Monique Blake, who noted that a neighbor told her that the suspect jumped from the roof down on to her SUV and then he went into an unlocked basement door.
Guzman-Rivera, who was just released from prison in April, on a robbery charges, stood before Bridgeport Superior Court Judge William Holden Friday facing charges of Possession of Narcotics (3 counts), Possession of Narcotics With Intent to Sell (WITS) (3 counts), Possession of Narcotics with intent to sell within 1,500 ft of a school (3 counts), Illegal Injuring of a Police Service Animal, and Burglary 2nd degree.
Guzman-Rivera's attorney told the judge his client is working and "he has no history of failure to appear in court. I understand there might be more charges coming. But, based on these chargers, Your Honor, I'm asking for a $50,000 bond."
But, the judge set bond at $350,000 and continued the case until September 11.
Monica Blake says, in the four years she and her children have lived in their Lewis St. apartment, police have arrested intruders on five separate occasions.Now is the perfect time to move, she says.