NEW YORK (PIX11) – David Justino is the kind of guy you want around when things go wrong. He was around when a cab jumped the curb on 6th avenue and slammed into Siân Green visiting from the UK last month – severing her left leg.
Justino, who happened to be walking nearby, rushed to the scene and created a makeshift tourniquet to help control the heavy bleeding — with a belt and a dog leash. “I had to hold the belt while I did the dog leash, then I gave the dog leash back while I held the belt,” Justino said. “Then we sat together . . . hanging on.”
“A dog leash and a belt, two mundane things you wouldn’t think of, but they saved her life,” said Dr. Oz, who also rushed to the scene.
But right after his good deed, Justino was fired from his construction job. The company says for lack of work – but the union plumber thinks it’s because in the frenzy of recognition that followed, he was deemed a distraction.
“I know the business, I know how it is,” Justino said. “We got a deadline to meet (and) this guy’s off giving an interview, maybe he’s not doing the job . . . get rid of him let’s just finish,” Justino said.
PIX11 caught up with Justino Tuesday as he struggles to come up with the money to keep his Yonkers pet store afloat. Money was coming from his construction gigs. On this same day victim Siân Green, out of the hospital, appeared on the Today Show demanding the cab driver who lost control in the road rage incident that took her leg be charged criminally.
Driver Faysal Himon held a press conference after the incident saying it was simply an accident and not his fault. Himon was flanked by taxi driver advocate Fernando Mateo who was in front of cameras to ask for a crackdown on unlicensed livery cabs taking business from legitimate drivers.
On Tuesday it was a strange day for karma believers: a man who saved a life is out of work, a tourist out of a hospital without a leg and the driver who hopped the curb in a fit of road rage got a slap on the wrist.
