Patient Climbs Out of Moving Ambulance on Long Island, Is Killed by Hit-Run Driver: Cops

The patient was sitting upright on a stretcher and was properly strapped in when he unbuckled himself, police said.

A man suffering from a mental illness unbuckled himself from a stretcher, opened the back door of a moving ambulance and jumped out before he was struck and killed by a vehicle that then left the scene, a police official said Tuesday.

Frank Ligrnetta, 51, of Bay Shore, was being taken from Stony Brook University Hospital on Long Island to a facility in Amityville on Monday evening when he fled out the back of the ambulance, said Tim Sini, deputy commissioner of the Suffolk County Police Department.

Ligrnetta hit the ground. 

"He was never standing, and he was run over shortly thereafter," said Sini. 

Sini said the ambulance was staffed by a driver and an attendant sitting in the back in a jump seat. He said the patient was sitting upright on a stretcher and was properly strapped in when he unbuckled himself. There didn't appear to be a struggle. 

Once Ligrnetta was out of the ambulance, which was traveling down a busy highway near an access ramp to the Long Island Expressway, he was struck and killed by a dark-colored sedan. That vehicle did not stop after hitting the man, Sini said.

The man's mental illness wasn't disclosed.

No arrest has been made in the hit-and-run.

Michael Cambridge, a neighbor and friend of Ligrnetta, said he knew the man had psychological issues but couldn't understand what would propel him out of the ambulance.

"I don't know if he was off his medication or forgot to take it or what but it's baffling," he said. 

Neighbor Nancy Elliott said she watched police kick in Lignretta's door last week and take him away in handcuffs. It's unclear why that happened, but it was the first in a series of events that ended in his death. 

"It's sad. He's a very nice guy," she said. 

The ambulance was impounded for a safety check; the investigation is continuing. 

Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 800-220-TIPS. 

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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