Police initially told a New York City family that Denise Owen, a sister and daughter, were fatally struck by a car in the early morning hours of Halloween.
After spending the next 18 hours coming to terms with his death and preparing to file a wrongful death lawsuit, the heartbroken Staten Island clan discovered that Owen had not actually died.
It was a case of mistaken identity, ABC New York reported.
Police arrived at the door of Sheila Nagengast, Owen’s sister, at 1:30 a.m. on October 31 to give her the terrible news.
“They said, ‘I’m sorry to inform you, but your sister was fatally killed in a car accident,'” Nagengast said.
Sheila Nagengast, Denise Owen’s sister, was visibly emotional as she recounted how she found her sister had supposedly died.
Pictured: Police meet in Nagengast’s lobby at 1:30 a.m. on Halloween to tell him that his 44-year-old sister was killed by a speeding car on Hyland Boulevard.
They said Owen, 44, was hit by a car on Hyland Boulevard, a busy street on Staten Island, and was thrown into the air upon impact.
‘My question was: how did you identify my sister? “They said there was some type of identification there and they were able to identify her,” Nagengast said.
Nagengast also explained that Owen suffered from schizophrenia and was homeless during certain times in his life.
With the relative certainty projected by the NYPD, the news reportedly spread quickly on Facebook, where people shared a Staten Island Advance article reporting on Owen’s supposed death.
Nagengast ran amok the next day, rushing to the hospital morgue and also meeting with attorney Jonathan D’Agostino to discuss filing a lawsuit.
While Nagengast was talking to D’Agostino, he received a call from his other sister, who saw Owen alive and well at the 7-Eleven near where police had said she had been murdered.
Nagengast even discussed the possibility of filing a wrongful death lawsuit on his sister’s behalf. Here, he is pictured with attorney Jonathan D’Agostino.
During that meeting, Nagengast was informed by his other sister that Denise Owens, pictured, was actually alive.
‘(My sister) called me on FaceTime, and my sister Denise, who was pronounced dead by the NYPD, Staten Island North Hospital, the morgue that has all her information and all the other… the newspapers, She is standing directly in front of my sister. .. alive and well,” Nagengast said.
The NYPD apologized to Nagengast and said they corrected the records.
The original Staten Island Advance article that reported Owens’ death was updated to include the NYPD’s error.
“During the course of our initial investigation, the NYPD misidentified the victim of a fatal vehicle collision,” Deputy Commissioner Carlos Nieves said in a statement. “Upon further investigation, proper identification and subsequent family notification was made.”
The outlet reported that the victim was actually Justine Perez, 37, of New Springville.
“In 35 years of handling accident cases, I have never had this confusion, I have never seen this confusion,” said D’Agostino, who is now shifting the focus of the lawsuit to focus on possible negligence by the NYPD. . and the emotional distress the family suffered.
“No one should go through what I went through in the last 24 hours…no one,” Nagengast said.