The Mattapan man charged with striking and killing a Hyde Park 4-year-old boy and then fleeing the scene pleaded not guilty today and was ordered held pending $15,000 bail.
Olguens Joseph, 30, of Mattapan, is charged with motor vehicle homicide by negligent operation, leaving the scene of personal injury or death and operating an unregistered vehicle. He appeared in municipal court in West Roxbury Tuesday morning at around 11 a.m. where a not guilty plea was entered on his behalf.
Many members of the family of victim 4-year-old Ivan Pierre lined the benches in the courtroom.
The proceedings were punctuated by Haitian Creole interpretation relayed over conference call as Joseph stood cuffed in the dock. He wore a maroon collared shirt under another long-sleeved shirt featuring drawings of teddy bears with Xs for eyes.
The prosecution asked for a bail of $15,000 and that if released he not be able to drive and to have no contact with his alleged victim’s family. The prosecutor added that Joseph has no criminal record but appears to be without a fixed address since his apartment lease expired at the end of last month. The judge accepted the recommendation and set bail at $15,000.
“The defendant’s actions in this case are just tremendously egregious,” the prosecutor said. “Not only did he flee the scene, but he took steps to conceal linking that car to him.”
The court issued a warrant for his arrest on Monday, and Joseph that day turned himself in.
“The presentation by the prosecution is interesting not just for what it says, but what he left out. What he wants you to believe is that my client committed a crime and tried to conceal his identity,” appointed defense attorney Winston Kendall said. “What he didn’t say is that my client turned himself in to the police station.”
He said Joseph works at Dunkin’ Donuts in Mattapan that the requested bail is beyond his means, but a bail of $5,000 would be reasonable, as he has every incentive to return to court to contest this case. He said that the report does not indicate that his client was read his rights before speaking with police, making the case “ripe for a motion to suppress.”
The police report notes that “the roadway was dry,” “the weather was clear,” and the streetlights glowed as a dark gray 2016 Chevrolet Spark sped through the 100-block of Wood Avenue in Mattapan “really fast,” in the words of an unidentified witness, a little before 9:30 p.m. July 18.
The vehicle struck and killed a young person, whose name is redacted in the report but whose family later identified to media as 4-year-old Ivan Pierre. A witness said the child had come into the roadway from the yard of 168 Wood Ave.
The vehicle sped on its way after a witness said it “went over the kid and sped up,” past the series of signs along the roadway asking for drivers to slow down and to “Act like your child lives here.” The prosecutor said the speed limit was 25 mph in the area.
Police, at the scene a few hours later as officers canvassed the neighborhood, said that an off-duty Boston firefighter had rushed to the child — who a police report stated suffered traumatic injury to his head, arms and legs — and attempted emergency CPR as an ambulance rushed to the scene. Ivan was taken to the emergency pediatric department of Boston Medical Center but pronounced dead at 10:49 p.m. His body was soon transported to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner on Albany Street.
The path to Joseph as the suspect was not an easy one. One witness at the scene, who “heard the ‘bash'” of the collision, said the car that struck the child was possibly a black Mercedes. Another witness said it was “a white Jeep with a back tinted video.”
A canvas for surveillance video from the scene and roads leading toward it bore fruit the next morning. Video shows a “gray colored compact, hatchback sedan” traveling northbound on Wood Avenue, crossing Stafford Street, seconds before 9:29 p.m., headed toward Cummins Highway. A person entered the roadway, the brake lights glowed briefly, but the car hurried on.
Later that day, the Boston Regional Intelligence Center shared video and images of the suspect vehicle from recovered surveillance footage to area agencies. The Boston Police released the same materials to the public on July 20 and asked for help. A new posting would come July 25, this time with a stock image of a 2016 Chevy Spark to add some detail to the low-resolution stills.
Someone called the police that day — a week after Ivan Pierre was killed — and police followed the lead to the Joseph residence on Hazelton Street in Mattapan. The prosecutor said at the hearing that the license plate affixed to the Chevy matched a 2011 Honda Accord owned by the suspect.
The Chevy was gone, but an unregistered Acura RDX SUV was parked in the driveway. An unidentified female answered the door and said that Joseph wasn’t home, but then he emerged from a back bedroom and shared his story in Haitian Creole.
He had purchased the Chevy from a man named “Lou,” according to the police report from the interview, but had no paperwork for the purchase and had exchanged the Spark for the RDX because the hatchback had been “too small for his family.”
Joseph said that on July 18, the night Ivan Pierre would die, he drove to “near a shipping company or office” on River Street in Mattapan, taking a route that included Wood Avenue in Hyde Park, to finish his payment on the car. “Lou” will say in his own interview that he was in a barbershop when Joseph gave him the $1,000 balance on the $3,000 car. Joseph allegedly told police his own 3-year-old son accompanied him on the drive.
“Mr. Joseph stated that he was not in any collision while driving on Wood Avenue on July 18, 2023,” the interview report states. “Mr. Joseph stated that he did not strike and kill a 4-year-old boy and flee the scene on Wood Avenue.”
“Lou” said that he noticed a dent on the hood of the Chevy that had not been there when he sold it to Joseph, and that the car had a pending new owner and was in a body shop. Police photographed the car and towed it to police headquarters for analysis.
This is a developing story.