Amandeep Singh was sentenced to eight and a third to 25 years in prison on Feb. 7 for causing the high-speed drug- and alcohol-fueled crash that killed two teenaged Roslyn tennis players when he plowed into their car on May 3, 2023.
Judge Helene Gugerty delivered the sentence at Nassau County court, where friends and family of 14-year-old victims Drew Hassenbein and Ethan Falkowitz packed the courtroom. Singh, also of Roslyn, had initially pleaded not guilty in June 2023, which his attorneys said allowed them time to sort through the evidence. His lawyers then said they had “no choice but to finally take responsibility” when Singh’s plea changed in January.
“Your anger towards me is fully understood and totally justified,” Singh said in a statement in the courtroom. He was unable to look at the victims’ families.
Singh had pleaded guilty to 10 charges, including aggravated vehicular homicide, two counts of second-degree manslaughter, two counts of second-degree assault, leaving the scene of an incident without reporting it as a felony, two counts of third-degree assault, driving while ability impaired by the combined influence of alcohol and a drug and driving while intoxicated. Prosecutors said that he was high on cocaine and had a blood alcohol content of 0.15% four hours after the accident, nearly twice the legal limit.
Nine people gave victim impact statements at the sentencing. The driver of the other vehicle that Singh hit: Zach Sheena, and eight members of the Hassenbein and Falkowitz families. Each person reflected on the boys and asked the judge to give a maximum sentence.
“Instead of picking up my son at school, I had to pick him up at the morgue, instead of watching him use his tennis racket like a magic wand, I had to bury it with him,” Hassenbein’s father said in his statement.
“You stole my heart and soul,” Falkowitz’s mother said in the courtroom.
Many left the courthouse in tears, including those who watched the sentencing from one of two other rooms used to broadcast the proceeding.
Singh fled the scene and was found hiding behind a dumpster in a parking lot when he was apprehended by police, according to reports.
“The defendant’s criminal conduct was unconscionable, and in my mind, nothing short of the maximum prison sentence for the top count charge would be enough to hold this defendant accountable for the devastation that he caused,” Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly said at a press conference after Singh’s hearing in January.
She added to the sentiment after the sentencing, saying that Singh will have “four walls of a prison cell” to look forward to.
“No family should ever have to endure the pain that Ethan and Drew’s family have endured, losing a child to an act that is so preventable,” Donnelly said.
Singh had been driving a 2021 Dodge Ram TRX at speeds up to 95 miles per hour in a 40-mph zone on North Broadway in Jericho while under the influence of alcohol and cocaine on the night of the accident, according to authorities. He veered into oncoming traffic when he hit an Alfa Romeo carrying four teenagers who had been at Buffalo Wild Wings celebrating a high school tennis match, according to the district attorney.
Hassenbein and Falkowitz were killed instantly while the other two teenagers in the car were taken to the hospital for treatment, according to reports. Hassenbein and Falkowitz both attended Roslyn Middle School and were members of Roslyn High School’s varsity tennis team.
Support for the families of the deceased flooded in from the community after the incident. Many local camps, leagues and organizations grieved the loss of the two teenagers.
Falkowitz’s father called out New York State for striking down the Grieving Families Act, a proposal that would have permitted families of wrongful death victims to recover compensation for emotional suffering. The bill was vetoed for a third time by Gov. Kathy Hochul in December 2024, according to published reports.
“The state has failed my son,” he said after the sentencing.
