A Brooklyn mother who has wept every day for 13 years over the slaying of her good Samaritan son by a homicidal driver is shedding tears of relief now that a fugitive suspect has been nabbed in the callous cold-case killing.
“Everybody was happy when we got this guy,” said 80-year-old Anne Marie Darbouze, whose son was run down with a car after sticking up for a stranger fighting with her now-arrested boyfriend. “I’ve been crying every day since that happened. Every day. He was my only son.”
Accused killer Anthony Cherestal, 46, was busted in the Dominican Republic and extradited on charges of murder for allegedly driving his vehicle onto the sidewalk, mowing down Emile Auguste on Sept. 3, 2010.
The 39-year-old victim, a correction officer who died in the hospital 18 days later, left behind a baby daughter who is now 15.
Obtained by Daily News
Victim Emile Auguste
“This guy just took his car and drove over his body twice. He hit my son on his body and his head,” recalled the mom in an exclusive interview with the Daily News.
The driver was seeking revenge after Auguste tried to stop him from fighting at a neighborhood party they both attended earlier that day.
“The guy was fighting with his girlfriend and my son tells him, ‘You are not supposed to hit a woman,’ ” Darbouze said.
Law enforcement sources confirmed Auguste intervened in an attempt to defuse the ugly situation after seeing the stranger arguing with the woman.
Cherestal was driving with the girlfriend when he later spotted Auguste taking out the garbage, according to Darbouze.
Auguste’s cousin was visiting from Canada and watched in horror as the irate driver raced toward the victim, leaving the critically injured victim on the sidewalk outside Auguste’s home on Foster Ave. near E. 53rd St. in East Flatbush about 5:15 a.m. The driver sped off.
Medics took the victim to Kings County Hospital, where Auguste clung to life for nearly three weeks before his death on Sept. 21, 2010.
Before the crash, Darbouze saw her devoted son frequently. “Every Valentine, Mother’s Day, he always bought me flowers, perfume,” she recalled.
But she couldn’t bear to see him in bad shape in the hospital and so waited downstairs while his sister checked on him. Darbouze broke into sobs as she remembered the call from her daughter with word of his passing.
“You should see when my son died, the funeral,” recalled Darbouze. “It was like a president passed away. Many people. Everyone was his friend. Everyone!”
“[He was] a good son, good boy,” she added. “Nobody made a complaint about my son. Nobody. He’s a quiet man.”
While rumors swirled about Cherestal fleeing to Texas and then to Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, Darbouze said she prayed endlessly for an arrest.
“My daughter called me and said, ‘Mom, the guy who killed my brother got arrested,’ ” she said. “After 13 years!”
Cherestal bolted from the scene and fled the city at some point, with a warrant finally issued for his arrest in 2018, authorities say. He was extradited to New York on Oct. 3 to face prosecution on the murder charge, entering a plea of innocence at a Brooklyn Criminal Court appearance one day later.
“I was praying all the time. Last week, I said to myself, ‘My God, I hope they caught this guy,’ ” Darbouze said. “When I went to the investigator, somebody told me, ‘Don’t worry. We will get him. And this case will never close until we get him.’ ”
Cherestal is being held without bail at Rikers Island pending his next court appearance on Jan. 10.
Darbouze said the passage of time hasn’t eased the pain for her teen granddaughter.
“She misses her dad,” Darbouze said. “She’s always sad. … Very painful. Very painful.”
With John Annese and Elizabeth Keogh
Rebecca White, Larry McShane
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