New video shows wrong-way driver getting on Miami expressway, killing 5 in violent crash
The silver car makes a left from Northwest 67th Avenue, the wrong way on a one-way road next to the Palmetto Expressway, the surveillance video shows. The driver is seemingly oblivious to the danger — even as his car whizzes past a large cargo truck going the opposite way.
The road, next to a shopping center on the northside of the Palmetto, is as an exit-ramp for the expressway. But Infiniti Q50 enters it and continues, accelerating even as other cars continue streaming past, another video angle shows.
A third video, taken from a car dealership alongside the Palmetto, shows the deadly result. At some 80 miles per hour, the Infiniti zooms past other cars until plowing directly into a gray Honda, which spins — sparks flying — and careens across the lanes, crashing into a guardrail near the side of the expressway.
The three video clips, released Friday by prosecutors, show the violent early morning crash on Aug. 27 that killed the five young people who had been in the Honda. The clips were entered as evidence in a hearing for Maiky Simeon, the Infiniti driver who is now charged with five counts of vehicular manslaughter.
Those killed: Giancarlo Arias, Daniella Marcano, Valeria Peña, Briana Pacalagua and Valeria Cáceres.
A Miami-Dade prosecutor, at Tuesday’s detention hearing, said he will charge Simeon with DUI manslaughter after blood tests revealed that the driver was drunk. Proescutors, seeking to keep Simeon behind bars before trial, also told the judge about his car reaching 80 mph as drove into on-coming traffic.
“He has every reason to try and flee,” Assistant State Attorney Shawn Abuhoff told the judge.
Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Diana Vizcaino agreed, and ordered Simeon held in jail. He’s been detained since rescuers pried him from the wrecked car that Saturday morning.
The video clips — two of which were taken from a McDonald’s at the shopping center at the corner of Northwest 67th Avenue, the third from a car dealership — will now be key evidence against Simeon in any future trial. Other key evidence: his toxicology test, which showed a blood-alcohol content level of .152, nearly double the legal limit in Florida.
Simeon is expected to plead not guilty at his arraignment on Monday in Miami-Dade circuit court.
This story was originally published September 9, 2022 at 1:35 PM.