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Pol's campaign bus kills boy, 9
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-01-07 16:03

A 9-year-old Queens boy was killed Tuesday when he was mowed down by a motor home advertising a City Council candidate's campaign.

Ibrihim Ahmed died immediately upon getting struck at the intersection of Cross Bay Blvd. and Liberty Ave. in Ozone Park, cops and witnesses said.

Police arrested the driver, Alexander Aponte, 22, of the upper East Side, on charges of driving with a suspended license. The accident happened at 3:40 p.m. in front of horrified kids and parents walking home from schools in the area.

"He was crossing by himself and then the [motor home] hit him. I don't think he saw it coming," said 10-year-old Dario Roman, who was walking with his mother and two sisters when the accident occurred.

Witnesses said Ibrihim, a fourth-grader at Public School 63 in Ozone Park, was racing to his house on nearby 79thSt. when he stepped in front of the motor home advertising the campaign of Republican Mike Ricatto.

Ricatto, a businessman running in the Feb. 24 special election for the City Council seat vacated by incoming state Sen. Joseph Addabbo, could not be reached for comment.

The motor home was decorated with banners boasting Ricatto's campaign slogans, "It's about Jobs" and "Vote for a Proven Job Creator."

Witness Raymond Sierra, 19, said it appeared Aponte was attempting to beat the traffic light when he hit the boy, who was walking in the crosswalk. "It looked like he was trying to make the light," said Sierra, explaining that the light had turned yellow when the motor home struck the child.

The accident was under investigation last night. A woman identifying herself as Ibrihim's cousin rushed to the scene to find the boy's body lying in the intersection under a white blanket.

The 22-year-old cousin, who did not want to be identified, described Ibrihim as a "fun and active" boy.