Incident location, Long Island
What Happened
A Woodmere intersection became the scene of a deadly high-speed crash on March 19, 2026, when a father driving his young son to school was struck by a driver allegedly traveling more than double the posted speed limit — a collision that would prove fatal nearly three weeks later. According to Long Island Press, Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly announced the arraignment of East Rockaway resident Brayan Romero Flores on Thursday, May 28, 2026, in connection with the death of 39-year-old Michael Kreindler of Woodmere.
On the morning of March 19, Kreindler was driving his 10-year-old son to school in his 2023 Tesla Model 3, traveling westbound on University Place toward its intersection with Branch Boulevard. At the same time, Flores was allegedly operating his 2019 Honda Accord northbound on Branch Boulevard at a dangerously high rate of speed, prosecutors said. As Kreindler attempted to make a left turn onto Branch Boulevard, Flores’ vehicle allegedly struck the Tesla with tremendous force, leaving both cars with severe damage. The crash site, a residential intersection in Woodmere in Nassau County’s South Shore, became the focal point of a multi-week investigation that ultimately led to a manslaughter indictment.
Kreindler was transported to a hospital with serious injuries following the collision. His 10-year-old son, who was in the car with him, was also hospitalized, though he sustained only minor injuries. Kreindler, however, did not recover. He remained hospitalized and on life support for nearly three weeks until April 7, when he was pronounced dead, according to Long Island Press. What began as a routine school-day morning run ended in tragedy for a Nassau County family.
The speed at which Flores was traveling was documented in stark detail by physical evidence recovered from his own vehicle. A search warrant executed for the event data recorder from Flores’ car revealed that just one second before the crash, he was allegedly driving 81 miles per hour — more than double the speed limit on that road, DA Donnelly said. The data further showed that Flores allegedly applied the brakes only one second before impact and had been driving at 99% acceleration as recently as five seconds before the collision, according to prosecutors. The recorder data painted a picture of a driver who made little effort to slow down before striking Kreindler’s car.
Additional evidence came from Flores’ own dash camera footage. That footage allegedly showed Flores running a red light approximately five minutes before the fatal crash, while traveling at roughly 77 miles per hour — a speed visible on his own dashboard speed indicator, Long Island Press reports. Together, the event data recorder and dash camera evidence formed a compelling evidentiary record that DA Donnelly presented as part of the indictment announcement. Flores was arraigned in Nassau County on Thursday, May 28, 2026 — more than two months after the crash and more than seven weeks after Kreindler’s death.
Location & Road Context
The crash took place at the intersection of University Place and Branch Boulevard in Woodmere, a hamlet on Nassau County’s South Shore within the Town of Hempstead. Branch Boulevard is a north-south arterial road that passes through several densely populated South Shore communities, and University Place is a local street in a residential neighborhood where schools and families are regularly present during morning hours. The intersection sits in a part of Woodmere where speed limits are set to protect pedestrians and local traffic — making Flores’ alleged speed of 81 mph at the point of impact especially alarming to investigators. For more on traffic conditions in the area, see our coverage of roads across Nassau County.
Woodmere and the surrounding communities of East Rockaway, Hewlett, and Lawrence have seen repeated concerns about speeding on local and connector roads. Nassau County has not been immune to serious and fatal crashes driven by excessive speed, and this incident underscores the danger that high-speed driving poses even on surface streets. Drivers on Long Island roads navigating residential intersections face unpredictable turning movements, and crashes at unsignalized or poorly-visible intersections can carry catastrophic consequences.
Investigation & Legal Proceedings
Brayan Romero Flores was arraigned on Thursday, May 28, 2026, in Nassau County on charges of manslaughter, assault, criminally negligent homicide, and reckless driving, Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly announced. He pleaded not guilty to all charges. If convicted on the top count of manslaughter, Flores faces a prison sentence of up to 7 to 15 years, according to DA Donnelly. He was due back in court on June 4, 2026 for further proceedings, per Long Island Press.
The investigation leading to the indictment was built substantially on physical and digital evidence recovered from Flores’ own vehicle. Investigators executed a search warrant for the event data recorder — sometimes called a “black box” — which captured speed and acceleration data in the seconds immediately preceding the crash. The dash camera footage, also recovered from Flores’ car, provided a separate and damning record of his driving behavior in the minutes before the fatal intersection. The combination of pre-crash red-light running and sustained extreme acceleration presented by prosecutors makes this one of the more evidence-rich reckless driving cases to emerge from Nassau County in recent years. For more on how accident investigations and legal proceedings unfold on Long Island, visit our dedicated section.
Broader Impact
Under New York State law, a first-degree manslaughter conviction — or even a second-degree conviction in vehicular cases — carries significant prison exposure, and Nassau County has increasingly pursued aggressive charging strategies in fatal speed-related crashes. Flores’ case, with its documented 81-mph pre-impact speed and evidence of a red-light violation just minutes before the crash, is precisely the type of case in which prosecutors lean on “depraved indifference” and criminally negligent homicide theories alongside traditional manslaughter charges. For Nassau County families, this case is a grim reminder that reckless driving is not merely a traffic infraction — it is, in the eyes of the law, a potentially fatal and criminal act. Readers can review their rights following a serious crash on Long Island Traffic.