Injured Biker's Wife and Gloria Allred Say He Is 'Innocent Victim'
The wife of a biker injured in the SUV assault has hired attorney Gloria Allred.
Oct. 4, 2013— -- The wife of the motorcyclist who was critically injured in Sunday's melee between bikers and an SUV has hired prominent attorney Gloria Allred to represent her and talk about her husband's health.
Allred said today that Edwin Mieses was taken out of a medically induced coma on Wednesday, is in enormous pain, and has not yet been interviewed by police about his role in the confrontation, which included 20 to 30 motorcyclists and an assault on an SUV driver.
Mieses pulled over from the group ride on Sunday after another biker was hit by a Range Rover, Allred said. The Range Rover, driven by Alexien Lien, then sped away from the group of motorcyclists, hitting Mieses and others. Mieses suffered spinal injuries and two broken legs, she said.
Other bikers eventually caught up with Lien and he was assaulted.
Mieses was an "innocent victim" who was trying to "diffuse the situation," Allred said, after the first biker was bumped by the Ranger Rover and other bikers became angry and began slowing down and closing in on the Range Rover.
Mieses was urging bikers to keep riding and move on, she said, and he had his back turned and was walking back to his bike when he was "run over" by the Range Rover.
Mieses' wife, Dayana Mejia, and father, Edwin Mieses, Sr., appeared with Allred at a news conference today in New York.
"I love him so much it tears me up that anyone could think that Edwin in any way deserves what happened to him," Mejia said, crying.
The couple has not decided whether to file a lawsuit, Allred said, and they are not asking for charges to be pressed against Lien at this time.
New York City police believe they've identified the prime suspect who smashed Lien's SUV window with his helmet and attacked him, and are working to bring him into custody, according to law enforcement sources. He could be turning himself in to police as early as this evening, the sources said.
Police have not named the man or said when he might be apprehended for a confrontation during which the "terrified" SUV driver's wife called 911 four times in nine minutes.
The incident started Sunday afternoon as Lien and his wife, Rosalyn Ng, planned to celebrate their wedding anniversary with their 2-year-old daughter, Ng said in a statement Thursday released through the couple's attorneys. Instead, she said, they were swarmed by a motorcycle rally on Manhattan's West Side Highway.
A biker who was along for the ride said Lien was driving erratically on the highway moments before the initial confrontation occurred.
"He was all over the place when he got on the highway," Sean Thomas told ABC News on Thursday. "He started from this lane to that lane to this lane, speeding up and this was the reason he was surrounded."
Road Rage: NYC Motorcycle Attack
Ng and her husband have not responded directly to accusations that his driving prompted the confrontation. Police have not commented on that aspect of their investigation.
Dozens of bikers rode alongside Lien's Range Rover until a biker slowed down and the vehicles bumped, police said, noting that Lien then sped off, accelerating his SUV through the crowd of motorcyclists and hitting Mieses.
Lien took off because he felt threatened by the group, according to his wife.
The bikers then chased the Ranger Rover through the streets of Manhattan. The couple's fear was evident in Ng's 911 call from inside the Range Rover, according to NYPD Deputy Commissioner John McCarthy, who said that the tenor and number of her calls proved how "terrified" they were in the face of the group of bikers.