STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The lawyer for Pedro Abad, the former Linden, N.J. cop charged in a fatal wrong-way crash on the West Shore Expressway two years ago is fighting to prevent Abad's personnel file from coming into evidence at his trial, expected to start in mid-April.
"There is information in it of the nature that I believe could be prejudicial to the jury on the People's direct case," attorney Mario F. Gallucci said Thursday after a conference in state Supreme Court, St. George.
Gallucci declined to elaborate.
Justice Mario F. Mattei ordered a pretrial hearing on April 6 for arguments on the admissibility of Abad's Linden Police Department personnel file and disciplinary history as well as the defendant's prior driving while intoxicated conviction and arrest in New Jersey.
Prosecutors want the jury to hear that evidence, the defense wishes to suppress it.
Mattei set an April 10 jury selection date. The trial would likely start the following week.
Prosecutors allege Abad, 29, was drunk when he plowed into a tractor trailer shortly before 5 a.m., on March 20, 2015, killing Joseph Rodriguez, 28, and Linden P.O. Frank Viggiano, 28.
Abad was badly injured in the wreck as was another passenger, former Linden Police Officer Patrik Kudlac, 25.
Abad and his three passengers had been drinking at Curves, a Charleston strip club, shortly before the crash, said authorities.
Prosecutors said the original results of Abad's blood tests showed his blood alcohol content was .24 percent, or three times the legal limit. The legal threshold for driving while intoxicated in New York is .08 percent.
Recent tests conducted by the defense showed Abad had no drugs in his system.
On Thursday, Mattei denied a defense motion to suppress the blood samples taken from Abad at Richmond University Medical Center in West Brighton after the wreck.
The defense contends the samples were improperly taken and tested.
Since no government action was involved and the blood was taken for medical purposes, Mattei said the matter of how it was extracted and examined is an evidentiary issue for the jury to decide.
Justice Stephen J. Rooney previously denied a defense motion to suppress blood samples obtained via a warrant.
Gallucci said he is also moving to prevent prosecutors' accident reconstruction video from coming in to evidence.
As for his own case, the lawyer said he intends to call Kudlac to the stand if prosecutors don't.
The beared Abad, who appears to have lost some weight, was garbed in a gray dress shirt and black slacks.
He did not address the court.
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