2 Arrested For Fatal Crash

One driver’s decision to drive past the double yellow line on Middletown Avenue caused a three-vehicle crash that killed two people and severely injured six others. 

Police have now arrested the man allegedly behind the wheel, along with another driver who purportedly fled the scene.

The crash occurred Jul. 27, 2024, on Middletown Avenue, near the on-ramp to I‑91. Two passengers in separate cars, 19-year-old Madysin Hilker and 21-year-old Dajsha Knight, died from their injuries. 

Police, Mayor Justin Elicker, Hilker’s family, and one of the surviving passengers convened for a press conference last Friday at 1 Union Ave. to publicize two arrests in the case made earlier this month.

“People have a choice when they drive in our city,” said Elicker. ​“If you choose to drive dangerously, you can take someone’s life and you can take your own life.”

Police Chief Karl Jacobson said he believes that riders in all three cars were spectators (or potentially participants) of drag races in a ​“street takeover” on Foxon Boulevard that evening last July.

One arrestee, a 23-year-old, has been charged with two counts of manslaughter, six counts of first-degree assault, and two counts of second-degree assault, reckless driving, driving with a suspended license, improper passing, and failure to maintain proper lane.

The 23-year-old was allegedly the driver who attempted to pass the car ahead of him by crossing the double yellow line dividing the road. That car collided with a vehicle going the opposite direction — the car containing Hilker. It consequently smashed into a third car — the car that the driver was allegedly trying to pass, which contained Knight.

Police also arrested an 18-year-old who was allegedly driving that second car, in which Hilker was a passenger. An arrest warrant affidavit contends that the 18-year-old fled the scene of the crash, eventually showing up to the hospital alongside another passenger in the car claiming to have been injured in a bike accident. The 18-year-old allegedly lacked a valid driver’s license, adequate car insurance, and proper car registration. 

He has been charged with evading responsibility and interfering with an officer, along with misuse of a marker plate, operating an unregistered motor vehicle, insufficient insurance, and operating a motor vehicle without a license.

According to the affidavit, police believe that a total of 12 people had been inside the three cars involved in the crash. Two sustained ​“minor” injuries, six sustained ​“serious” ones, and Knight and Hilker lost their lives.

Knight was born and raised in New Haven, graduating from New Haven Academy in 2020. She baked elaborate cheesecakes, often to sell. According to her obituary, she loved animals, played the flute and clarinet, and left behind a fiancé.

A few weeks before her death at 21, she concluded a post for her mom’s most recent birthday in all-caps: ​“I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE.”

Hilker grew up in West Haven.

“Our home has been incredibly quiet without Mady,” said Hilker’s mother, Kendra Brown, at Friday’s press conference. ​“The pain is something no parent should have to endure.”

One of the survivors of the crash, Juliana Weber-Ortiz, said that Hilker was her best friend. ​“She was my safe space,” she said. ​“We were always together. We grew up together and we were ready to start our lives.” 

“I am a survivor of that night,” Weber-Ortiz continued. ​“I broke 60 percent of my body and they left me and Mady to die.” She said she still lives with the ramifications of those injuries, which are sometimes so painful she can’t get out of bed.

“Seeing people trying to speed, it’s not worth it,” she said. ​“You only have one life.”