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Mariana Edkins, 18 -- Car Accident

Published Wednesday, April 12, 2006 by Admin | E-mail this post

[1/10/06]

NEW YORK -- A Staten Island teenager who blogged about love, work and getting books for college was killed when her car was hit by a drunken driver's SUV that was going the wrong way, police said.

Mariana Edkins, 18, was riding in a car that collided with a sport utility vehicle going east in the westbound lane on Woodrow Road at about 12:30 a.m. Tuesday, police said. Josephine DiDonato, the 18-year-old driver of her car, was hospitalized in stable condition.

The SUV's driver, John Sambuco, 21, was arrested on charges of driving while intoxicated, manslaughter and criminal possession of a knife, police said.

The district attorney’s office told NewsChannel 4 he failed an alcohol test at the scene and admitted to police he had been drinking beers and taking the antidepressant Zanax before getting behind the wheel.

Edkins, in an online description of herself, said she loved hot pink, mini skirts and stilettos.

"I know I'll find something," she wrote on Nov. 8. "My life will move forward starting as soon as possible."

Friends and family, as they learned about her death, posted memories and messages of shock and sadness on the Web site where she wrote about her life.

"(It's) just so hard to go through,” said Mari Ann Edkins, the victim’s mother. "She was an innocent kid."

Edkins had just started school at the College of Staten Island and loved to run and be with her friends.

Her parents said she was trying to get home when she was killed.

"I've heard a lot of stories, (and) I read a lot of things," said Charles Edkins, the victim's father. "I would like to talk to the driver but she is in the hospital. She's going through a lot of pain herself."

The family laid a pink wreath at the scene that says 'beloved sister.'

Edkins' older sister, Delores, said she was a good girl, filled with life.

"She was an angel," Delores Edkins said in a television interview. "She didn't deserve to die like this. The person who did this is going to pay."

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