Hit-and-run driver who killed father of six on Manhattan highway arrested, cops say

Cops have arrested one of the two hit-and-run drivers who killed a 42-year-old father of six during a devastating crash on a Manhattan highway, police said Thursday.

Cary Brown, 28, was charged with manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and leaving the scene of an accident for the Aug. 3 crash on the Henry Hudson Parkway, according to cops.

Victim Joel Quintana was heading south on the highway toward W. 145th St. when a speeding gray BMW rammed him from behind at 10:57 p.m., police said.

He was knocked off his Honda Grom sport motorcycle and landed in the center lane of the highway, only to be run over by a speeding black Mercedes-Benz that was just a few seconds behind the first luxury car, cops said.

Police suspected that the two cars were racing when they rammed into Quintana.

“Not one of them had the remorse to stay behind,” the victim’s sister Carolina Rodriguez said in a tearful interview with the Daily News shortly after his death.

Quintana died shortly after the crash at Harlem Hospital.

Brown was driving the Mercedes, which he abandoned that night, according to a police source with knowledge of the case. Detectives were able to identify the owner of the car, who claimed he had loaned the vehicle to Brown.

Cops arrested Brown on a warrant early Thursday. The driver of the BMW remained at large.

“Through painstaking work and a sense of commitment to the victim, Highway Collision Investigation Squad investigators have brought one of the two people who is responsible for the fatal collision to face justice,” NYPD Inspector Sylvester Ge, the commanding officer of the NYPD Highway District, said Thursday.

“Our investigators will not rest until the second suspect is in our custody.”

Quintana was a manager at the Loew’s Hotel on the Upper East Side and enjoyed riding his motorcycle back and forth to work.

“He used it as his therapy,” Rodriguez said. “He’d say, ‘I’ll just glide to work today.’”

Hours before his death, one of Quintana’s sons rolled the motorcycle out to him before he drove off, Rodriguez recalled.

“Dad, there was an accident a few hours ago on the same highway. Just be very careful, please,” Rodriguez recalled the son telling Quintana. It was the last interaction the two had before his death, she said.

“He promised him he was going to be careful,” Rodriguez said. “He always made sure he was protected. He had his helmet, his gloves, his vest on. He was never one to drive crazy.

“They took a family man — a hardworking family man,” she cried. “[His] 6-year-old is very sad. He keeps asking for his dad.”

Brown’s arraignment in Manhattan Criminal Court was pending Thursday.