Driver Sentenced to Three Years in New Jersey Hit and Run Accident, Two Years after Crash
For more than two years, Joseph Bozzelli managed to avoid justice after he struck a pedestrian, left his body on the roadside, and sped off. If it hadn’t been for the untiring efforts of the victim’s mother, Bozzelli would still have been hiding from the law. However, last week he was sentenced to three years in state prison for his involvement in Brain Lilley’s death.
Bozzelli had been charged with causing a death while driving with a suspended license, and leaving the scene of an accident. Bozzelli has also had his license suspended. In October, 2006, Lilley was walking on the road at 2 in the morning, when he was struck by a vehicle driven by Bozzelli. His neck was broken, and he died instantly.
Bozzelli never stopped; not even to check if Lilley was alive. It was left to a passing driver who saw Lilley’s lifeless body lying by the roadside. Bozzelli was able to spend the next two years undetected by police, but he had not contended with the tenacity of Bozzelli’s mother Elizabeth, who never stopped looking for the man who was responsible for her son’s death. She distributed fliers asking for information about the accident. She even rented a billboard offering a reward for any information that could lead to her son’s killer. Finally in 2008, after an anonymous tip, Bozzelli was arrested.
However, prosecutors believe Bozzelli destroyed the vehicle he was driving, after the hit and run. Police could never find the vehicle, and there was no way of confirming if he was driving drunk that night. That’s why there were no charges of vehicular homicide against him.
Scott Grossman is a New Jersey wrongful death lawyer representing injured victims of auto accidents in Monmouth, Bergen, Passaic and Ocean Counties, and across the state of New Jersey.
