A man wanted for selling drugs stole a car and barreled into a 44-year-old cyclist during a wild police chase Wednesday afternoon in Greenwich Village, according to sources and witnesses.
The cyclist was riding in a bike lane on West 3rd Street and Mercer Street when the reckless, wrong-way motorist smashed into him — sending him flying to the pavement as police closely pursued the stolen vehicle shortly after 3 p.m., sources and witnesses said.
Moments before the crash, the driver slipped into someone’s black Ford Fusion as police zeroed in on him for previously selling narcotics, the NYPD said.
“There was a cyclist going the correct way down the street and the car hit the cyclist,” witness Ariadne Chan-Miller, 17, told The Post.
“It seemed like there were cops behind it and the cyclist flew up into the air and then fell down and the car kept going. It didn’t stop or anything. The cop had to stop behind because they didn’t want to run him over,” she said, adding she heard sirens and then an “immediate impact.”
The cyclist was not moving and his bike was left mangled, Chan-Miller recalled.
Medics transported the injured victim to NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue in stable condition with head and leg injuries, the NYPD said.
After the hit-and-run, the driver ran a red light near the corner of Mercer Street and Bleecker Street and “scraped the sides” of an Uber, Ariadne’s dad, Ron Miller, told The Post.
“It was going really fast and half of its windshield was knocked in, so I called 911.”
The driver eventually stopped and ditched the smashed-in sedan several blocks away on Prince Street near West Broadway before fleeing the scene, cops said.
He was still in the wind as of Wednesday night.
The chase came as police pursuits have surged this year, resulting in more than one car crash per day, local outlet THE CITY recently reported.
Additional reporting by Jack Morphet
