BY BRYAN SABELLA
Staff Writer
Authorities say an Edison man with four prior convictions for driving while intoxicated was drinking and driving yet again when he caused an accident that took the life of a Piscataway honor student who attended Metuchen’s St. Joseph’s High School on the evening of March 12.
Middlesex County Assistant Prosecutor Nicholas Sewitch said Philip Gonzalez, 43, Edison, was traveling south on Washington Avenue in Piscataway around 8:30 p.m. in a full-size 1991 Ford construction van when he ran a red light at Centennial Avenue, striking the passenger side of the 2002 Toyota 4Runner that 17-year-old Michael Partipilo was driving less than a mile from his home.
The 4Runner spun and flipped onto the passenger side, and Partipilo sustained significant head injuries.
Partipilo was pronounced dead at 9 a.m. the following Sunday at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where he was taken in critical condition after the accident.
Sewitch said Gonzalez was "grossly intoxicated" at the time of the crash and that following Partipilo’s death, charges were upgraded from aggravated assault to aggravated manslaughter.
The state Motor Vehicle Commission (MVC) confirmed that Gonzalez had four prior convictions for driving while intoxicated, the last of which took place in Metuchen in 1999.
In that conviction, state officials said, Gonzalez apparently mistakenly received a six-month suspension of his driving privileges as opposed to the 10 years a fourth offense mandates.
The MVC also confirmed that Gonzalez had 11 points on his license, one shy of the limit that results in a license suspension, and that his overall driving record contains 19 moving violations, nine accidents and a total of 12 license suspensions since he began driving in 1978.
Sewitch said Gonzalez was also charged with possession of under 50 grams of marijuana and with possession of drug paraphernalia.
As of press time, Gonzalez was being held at Middlesex County Adult Correction Center in North Brunswick on $500,000 bail.
A March 19 motion in state Superior Court in New Brunswick by his lawyer to have the bail reduced was rejected, court officials said.