LI Man Pleads Guilty To Killing 18-Year-Old In Hit-And-Run

A Deer Park man pleaded guilty today to killing a young Levittown woman in a hit-and-run in a gas station parking lot in November 2017.

Daniel Coppolo, 33, pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter, leaving the scene of an accident without reporting and tampering with physical evidence. He also pleaded guilty to third-degree robbery for a separate case where he used force against a security guard to flee a store after shoplifting.

According to Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas, Coppolo is expected to be sentenced to five to 15 years in prison on June 17.

“It is incomprehensible that this adult defendant could recklessly take the promising young life of 18-year-old, Taranjit Parmar, over a trivial fender bender,” Singas said. “Our continuing condolences go out to the Parmar family for their unbearable loss.”

Around 5 p.m. on Nov. 9, 2017, 18-year-old Taranjit Parmar was driving her 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee east on Hempstead Turnpike. Daniel Coppolo, who was driving a 2013 Toyota Tacoma pickup truck, pulled out of the parking lot of the Ultra Gas Station, located at 3300 Hempstead Turnpike. The two cars hit in a minor collision, and both drivers pulled into the parking lot near the gas station.

Parmar got out of her car and called her mother. While on the phone, Parmar yelled for Coppolo to stop and grabbed his truck as he started to move. Coppolo drove through the parking lot, dragging Parmar with his car, before running her over and fleeing the scene by driving the wrong way on Hemsptead Turnpike.

Witnesses called 911 and Parmar was rushed to a hospital in cardiac arrest by Nassau County Police Department paramedics. She died from her injuries that night.

Police searched for Coppolo for weeks. Eventually, officers found his car in the parking lot of a Target in Westbury, where he had been arrested for shoplifting from the store several days after he killed Parmar. When they inspected the truck, officers found that rubbing compound had been applied to the area damaged in the fender bender.

Coppolo, a former FDNY employee, was arrested on Dec. 23, 2017 for the death of Parmar.