Jury finds Almanza guilty on all counts in boy's hit-and-run death

A jury on Wednesday found that Sergio Almanza was intoxicated when he blew through a red light and fatally struck a 7-year-old boy leaving the River of Lights with his family in 2021.

Jurors found Almanza, 29, guilty of vehicular homicide while driving under the influence in the Dec. 12, 2021, death of the boy, Pronoy Bhattacharya, who was walking hand-in-hand with his father in a crosswalk at Central and Tingley.

Pronoy’s parents, who sat through every moment of the eight-day trial, said they felt satisfaction with the outcome.

“It’s not going to make our loss any less painful,” said Pronoy’s mother, Deepshikha Chowdhury, “but we are, in this moment, experiencing some amount of joy with the verdict that was delivered. We feel like justice has been served.”

The couple hugged moments after state District Judge Brett Loveless read the guilty verdicts. Each later embraced Assistant Attorney General John Duran.

Pronoy’s father, Aditya Bhattacharya, said the verdicts provide “momentary” relief from the loss of their son.

“It does make a difference,” he said. “I just wish there was a way to bring Pronoy back, but that’s not going to happen.”

Pronoy, a second-grader at Georgia O’Keeffe Elementary school, died at the scene shortly after he, his parents and a younger brother visited the popular holiday light display at the ABQ BioPark.

The verdicts settled the only issue contested by Almanza’s attorney, who argued that prosecutors had failed to prove that Almanza was intoxicated at the time of the fatal crash.

The 2nd Judicial District Court jury also found Almanza guilty of great bodily injury while driving under the influence for striking Pronoy’s father, who was hospitalized with facial fractures and other injuries.

Bhattacharya testified last week that he continues to suffer pain from the injuries.

Almanza also was convicted of knowingly leaving the scene of an accident, two counts of tampering with evidence, and driving an off-road vehicle on paved streets.

Almanza faces up to 27 years in prison. District Judge Brett Loveless has not scheduled a sentencing hearing.

On Wednesday, prosecutors showed jurors a police officer’s lapel camera video of a distraught Chowdhury screaming and wandering around Central Avenue in the moments after her son’s death.

The video also showed first responders attempting to save Pronoy, who was hurled 72 feet through the air by the impact from Almanza’s 2018 Can-Am off-road vehicle. The boy then skidded another 100 feet before coming to rest in the middle of Central.

Prosecutors with the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office also showed jurors surveillance video of Chowdury walking hand-in-hand with Pronoy’s 4-year-old brother several feet ahead of Pronoy and her husband at the moment of impact.

Chowdhury testified that she at first thought she had lost both her husband and her eldest son when she saw her husband lying in the road.

Almanza “blew through that light” traveling at least 50 mph at the moment he struck Pranoy, Assistant Attorney General Greer Staley said during closing arguments.

The light had been red for at least nine seconds at the moment of impact, and Almanza applied his brakes only 0.2 seconds before impact, a witness testified last week.

Jurors apparently rejected the arguments of Almanza’s attorney, Ahmad Assed, who told jurors that prosecutors offered no evidence that Alamanza had consumed alcohol before the fatal crash.

“The DWI is not there,” Assed said in closing arguments. “The evidence, when you just touch it, falls apart.”

Almanza did not dispute the allegations that he sped through a red light in his off-road vehicle and fatally struck the boy and his father. He also acknowledged fleeing the scene and attempting to hide his vehicle at a friend’s house after the fatal crash.

Police said Almanza fled to Mexico for more than a month after the crash and prior to his arrest in January 2022.

Assed had urged jurors to convict Almanza of vehicular homicide while driving recklessly, a third-degree felony, which would have cut nine years from his potential prison sentence.

Prosecutors told jurors that Almanza had been drinking for hours the day of Pronoy’s death, first while off-roading on the West Mesa, and later at El Sinaloense Mariscos and Grill in the 5000 block of Central near San Mateo. Assistant Attorney General John Duran told jurors that, under the law, Almanza needed to be intoxicated only “to the slightest degree” to be found guilty of DWI.

Duran showed jurors copies of two restaurant receipts showing that Almanza and others purchased about $175 worth of beer and “mango shots” shortly before Pronoy’s death.

“We aren’t saying he was drunk,” Duran said in closing arguments. “We’re saying he was impaired to the slightest degree.”