The woman charged in the Brooklyn crash that killed Broadway star Ruthie Ann Miles' young daughter and unborn child has died of an apparent suicide, a senior law enforcement official briefed on the case tells NBC 4 New York.
Dorothy Bruns, 44, was found dead in her Staten Island home Tuesday afternoon, the senior law enforcement official said. Authorities say pills and a note were found nearby.
Miles was walking with her friend and their two young children in Park Slope on March 5 when Bruns allegedly blew through a red light and plowed into the group, killing both children — Miles’ daughter, Abigail, and the friend's 1-year-old son, Joshua. All four were found on the pavement with various injuries.
Miles' unborn daughter initially survived the crash, but the actress miscarried a month before she was due. The loss was related to injuries from the crash.
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Bruns was eventually indicted in connection with the case; she was arrested at her Staten Island home May 3 on a 10-count indictment charging her with manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, assault and other crimes. She had faced 15 years in jail.
Bruns told police at the time she had medical issues — and though her license had been suspended she had not been criminally charged in the case until about two months after the crash. Prosecutors said she had suffered a seizure at the time of the collision, and had been driving in direct defiance of a doctor's orders following a hospitalization less than eight weeks prior. That hospitalization stemmed from yet another car crash — that time into a parked vehicle.
Police are investigating Bruns' death, the senior law enforcement official said.