Beloved Upper East Side doorman is mowed down and killed by off-duty cop driving the wrong way
A beloved New York City doorman was killed when an off-duty police officer allegedly slammed into his vehicle while driving in the wrong direction on a highway.
Manuel Boitel, who had served as a doorman for the St. Tropez luxury condominium building on the Upper East Side for more than 30 years, was heading to his home in the suburb of Peekskill when he was struck by a wrong-way driver on the Taconic State Parkway at around 11.39pm on January 22, Our Town New York reports.
New York State police now say Tiffany Howell, 47, an off-duty NYPD sergeant, had been driving south in the northbound lane when her 2021 Infiniti collided with Boitel's 2024 Toyota.
Howell, an 18-year veteran of the NYPD, had just left a Holy Smoke 2026 cigar social at Mom's Cigar Warehouse in Scarsdale, which featured an open bar, before she drove in the wrong direction, according to the New York Daily News.
As a member of the NYPD's Holy Name Society, Howell helped organize the social - which was located just about 10 miles from the site of the fatal crash.
They were both transported to Westchester Medical Center, where Boitel was pronounced dead in the early morning hours on January 23.
Howell did not sustain any life-threatening injuries in the crash, and is expected to survive, state police said.
She has not yet been charged with any wrongdoing as authorities wait for the toxicology results and other findings, according to ABC 7.
But she has been placed on modified duty and stripped of her firearms and badge pending the New York State Attorney General's investigation into the crash.
Manuel Boitel, who had served as a doorman for the St. Tropez luxury condominium building on the Upper East Side for more than 30 years, was killed in a wrong-way crash on a parkway
Tiffany Howell, 47, an off-duty NYPD sergeant, was driving south in the northbound lane when her 2021 Infiniti collided with Boitel's 2024 Toyota
She has since also applied for a vested separation retirement with the NYPD's pension fund.
Howell is now expected to retire at the end of the month, even though she has two more years before she could collect her full pension.
Meanwhile, Boitel's adult sons rushed to the scene of the crash early on January 23.
Eric Boitel woke his brother, Marvin, because their mother noticed their father's GPS tracker showed he was stuck in the same spot on the parkway for more than an hour, CBS News reports.
The brothers then drove to the location of the crash in Mount Pleasant and saw the wreckage - but were initially told that their father was able to be resuscitated.
'The last thing I thought was that we were gonna find out that he ... passed away,' Marvin said.
He remembered his father as a mentor who 'helped me become the man I am today.
'He was a jack of all trades. He helped me learn maintenance stuff. He knew how to fix anything and if he didn't, he would find a way to figure it out.
The New York Attorney General's Office is now investigating the crash
'Anytime I'm fixing stuff around the house, I feel closer to him because he taught me how to do it,' he continued, adding that his father was 'super, super caring.'
'It doesn't matter what time we needed to talk, it doesn't matter where he was, whether at work or just coming home from work. If something was bothering my brother or me, he would be there, rush home from work to help us.'
'He was an amazing, amazing father.'
Boitel, who emigrated to the United States from the Dominican Republic as a teenager, was married for 42 years and was a member of 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union.
'We have been deeply saddened to learn about the passing of our union brother Manuel Boitel,' union president Manny Pastreich said in a statement. 'We honor his life and mourn his loss.
'Manuel put more than 30 years of service into making his condo building home and he was taken just shy of enjoying the retirement he deserved. Our thoughts are with his family and his loved ones.'
An online fundraiser to help the family with his funeral expenses also described how Boitel 'was always the first to help others, often putting the needs of those around him before his own.'
It noted that he 'regularly donated to funds supporting police officers, as he always dreamed of becoming one himself.'
Now, 'knowing that the driver was a police officer makes this loss even harder for the family, but it also strengthens their belief that this case deserves a full, fair and transparent investigation,' family attorney Jonathan Roberts told the Daily News.
