BUFFALO, NY - "She deserved better than this and so did we," said Dana Stanton, as she sat in the living room of a North Buffalo home, alongside her father who lives upstairs.
Both Stanton and Joseph LoTempio, 74, are expressing frustration with the amount of time it has taken authorities to conclude an investigation into the death of LoTempio’s wife of 33 years.
Susan LoTempio was 64 when she was fatally struck by a Buffalo police vehicle on March 30.
LoTempio recalls it was on the morning of Good Friday when his wife stepped out for her usual morning walk around 6am.
After she left, he went to a nearby Starbucks to get a coffee for himself and tea for her to enjoy when she returned.
When she failed to come back LoTempio, worried that something might have happened to Susan, set out to look for her.
He didn’t have to travel far to find the horrifying truth.
I Had a Bad Feeling
“As I drove down Delaware (Ave.) near Hertel I saw a bunch of police cars and had a very bad feeling it was her. Sure enough it was,” LoTempio recalled.
About a half mile from their home, Susan had been struck near Tennyson and Hertel, by an officer responding to a non-emergency call. From they've been told, the officer did not have his lights or sirens on.
“They advised us that they didn't have to use them for the level of call that it was," Stanton recalled.
As a matter of course, the investigation was turned over to an outside agency – in his case the New York State Police- to avoid any conflict of interest with the accident reconstruction and the findings it might yield.
In addition, as this was a death of a civilian involving police, the NY State Attorney General’s office is also investigating.
“Two to three months was our original expectation for answers and now we're at 8 months with nothing,” said Stanton. "It’s been unbearable to try and grieve properly for my mother without having the answers we seek.”
Seeking Answers
LoTempio and his daughter contacted 2 On Your Side last week after they claimed that their recent calls to Wanda Perez Maldonado, who was appointed as head of the AG's special investigation unit in May, had gone ignored as of late.
That assertion is something contested by a spokesperson for the Attorney General’s office.
“I spoke to her three weeks ago and she (Perez-Maldonado) was very apologetic and she agreed with me that it should not have taken this long, and told me and my attorney she would have word to me ‘well before Thanksgiving’. Those were her words,” said LoTempio.
Perez-Maldonado did not return a call seeking comment.
However, in response to our inquiry, a spokesperson for the AG’s office says that LoTempio might have misunderstood what he had been told, and that while the office understood the family’s need for closure, they were informed several times in recent weeks that the investigation was still ongoing.
Spokesperson Amy Spitalnick also said that while the Attorney General’s office was doing its best to complete the investigation as soon as possible, it never would have committed to deadline such as LoTempio claims.
In addition, according to Spitalnick, “after speaking with the family's lawyer again over the last few days, we also left a message for the family again earlier this morning to clear up any confusion.”
LoTempio later confirmed he did receive a voice mail from the AG's office at 10:33 AM Monday, which would have been when we were interviewing him and his daughter.
“We just want some answers,” LoTempio said.
These Things Take Time
According to Spitalnick, some “key evidence” in the case, was only received by the Attorney General within the past few weeks, while noting that investigations of these types which are quite detailed, generally take many months - if not longer- to complete, in order that they are thorough, fair, and impartial.
In the meantime, the date of what would have been Joe and Susan's 34th anniversary is approaching, and will arrive just before Christmas…his first one without her in all that time.
“She's on my mind every single day...this was a woman that every man would want for their wife," LoTempio said.