Ex-Cop Pleads Guilty To Killing Student While Driving Drunk

WILLIAMSBURG, BROOKLYN, NY — A former NYPD officer pleaded guilty last week to killing an MIT student while driving drunk in Williamsburg, court records show.

Nicholas Batka, 30, admitted in Brooklyn Criminal Court Monday that he committed aggravated vehicular homicide and other charges that stem from the death of 21-year-old college student Andrew Esquivel in 2016, according to court records.

Batka was intoxicated when his 2012 Dodge Durango jumped the curb and slammed into four students on North Eighth Street and Bedford Avenue at about 3 a.m. on July 16, prosecutors said.

Esquivel lost his life and three other students — Sophia Tabchouri, 20, Divya Menezes, 23, and James Balchunas, 24 — were hospitalized with severe injuries, court records show.

Police arrested Batka after he refused to take a blood test and charged him with manslaughter, Patch reported at the time.

Batka pleaded guilty on Nov. 20 and will remain out on bail until he is sentenced in February, court records show.

“Mr. Batka has intended to accept full responsibility for the pain and loss he has caused since the moment this case began,” the ex-cop's attorney Michael Farkas told the New York Post.

“He hopes that his guilty plea will at least afford the victims and their families some sense of closure.”

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