A Long Island federal judge has died and a boy has been seriously injured by a hit-and-run driver in Florida – who was allegedly high and according to police said she was Harry Potter.
Judge Sandra Feuerstein, 75, died in Boca Raton after being hit; the driver’s car was later located, Newsday reported, referring to local police.
Boca Raton police said according to Newsday that the investigation was continuing.
The boy, only six years old, was also seriously injured when the vehicle that hit Feuerstein jumped on the curb, according to WPTV.
The hit-and-run driver, Nastasia Andranie Snape (23), was found near the nearby station in nearby Delray Beach where she collided with her car.
When police approached the car, Snape allegedly started having convulsions, later fought with medics and told them she was Harry Potter. Police allegedly found drugs in her purse.
Snape would be charged with vehicle murder, hit-and-run death and leaving the scene of an accident with an injury, the TV station reported.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District tweeted condolences to Feuerstein’s family on Saturday.
“While mourning her tragic death, we also remember Judge Feuerstein’s unwavering commitment to justice and service to the people of our district and our country,” Acting U.S. Attorney Mark Lesko said.
Feuerstein recently chaired the case of former NYPD officer Valerie Cincinelli, who is accused of paying her boyfriend to kill her estranged husband. Cincinelli, who resigned from power last month, will plead guilty Friday.
Feuerstein, who worked in the Central Islip courthouse, studied at the University of Vermont in 1966 and worked as a teacher in New York City until 1971, according to a profile on the court website.
She earned her law degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in 1979. She became a judge in the Nassau District Court in 1987 and was elected a judge in the Supreme Court in 1994.
She was appointed co-judge of the Second Department of Appeals in 1999 and served in that role until former President George W. Bush nominated her to the federal bench in 2003.
Feuerstein’s mother, Annette Elstein, who died at the age of 99 in April 2020, was also a judge and swore in her daughter as an appeals judge. The couple are apparently the first mother-daughter judges in the country.
Feuerstein also taught at the Hofstra University School of Law and was a former president of the Nassau County Women’s Bar Association and former vice president of the New York State Women’s Bar Association.