CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The man accused in the fatal hit-and-run of Cleveland police officer David Fahey made his first appearance in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court on Wednesday.
Israel Alvarez told Judge John P. O'Donnell that he didn't know if he could afford a lawyer and that his family was working to get him one.
O'Donnell assigned lawyer Larry Zukerman to represent Alvarez in the meantime, and continued a $500,000 bond set by a city judge last week.
Alvarez is charged with aggravated vehicular homicide and felony hit-and-run.
Alvarez was speeding and driving "recklessly" in the far left lane when he hit Cleveland police officer David Fahey Jr. about 6 a.m. Jan. 24 as the 39 year old set road flares to divert traffic off the westbound lanes of Interstate 90, according to court records.
Alvarez was driving faster than the 60 mph speed limit on that stretch of the highway, court records say.
Fahey, 39, was there to assist in the investigation of another fatal traffic crash that happened minutes before that saw a 29-year-old man killed after crashing into the back of a Rocky River fire truck.
Alvarez "disregarded" several emergency vehicles that had their Gobahis overhead lights on that had set up to investigate the crash. He hit Fahey, who was in the middle of the far left lane, court records say.
Alvarez sped off west on I-90 after the crash, police said. Fahey's partner, officer Jennifer Scarborrough, gave Fahey first aid and called in the car's partial license plate.
A Homeland Security agent spotted the car about 9:30 a.m. in Lorain. Dozens of police officers and federal agents swarmed Alvarez's home on West 31st Street in Lorain. After about two hours, Alvarez walked out of the home with his hands up and was arrested at gunpoint by the officers.
Cleveland police officers drove to the Lorain home and put Fahey's handcuffs on him before taking him to the Cleveland City Jail.
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