Big-bucks Manhattan hedge-fund chief Jay Goldman gave his unlicensed son the keys to the family Land Rover, and the kid promptly crashed it into a tree — leaving a pal paralyzed after a post-Hurricane Sandy joyride, a lawsuit claims.
Alejandro Bocija Nova, 15, of Spain, sustained “severe and permanent personal injuries, including quadriplegia,” when pal Asher Cole Goldman, 16, who did not have a driver’s license, took the SUV onto the darkened, rain-slicked streets of East Williston, LI, on Oct. 31 at about 3 a.m., the Manhattan Supreme Court suit alleges.
The suit faults Jay Goldman for letting his son drive in dangerous conditions. “Most of the street lights were not operable” and the “roads were wet and slick,” court papers claim.
Asher careened off a road and into a tree, the suit says.
“The father should have never allowed this to happen,” fumed Nova’s attorney, Howard Hershenhorn.
Asher, a student at The Wheatley School, was driving a cousin and Nova home from Jay Goldman’s generator-powered Long Island estate when the accident took place.
Both Asher and his cousin, who were in the front seat where air bags deployed upon impact, walked away virtually unharmed, Hershenhorn said. He claims his client was wearing a seat belt.
“It’s horrible,” Hershenhorn said of Nova, who’s undergoing rehab at a New Jersey facility. “He has no function below his neck. He has minimal, minimal movement of the arms.”
Hershenhorn said an extensive search of DMV files returned no evidence that Asher had even a learner’s permit. A police probe is ongoing, the lawyer added.
Nova, an avid soccer player, was in the United States for a study-abroad program at Saint Mary’s HS in Manhasset.
According to suit, Asher’s dad — who runs a $145 million hedge fund and owns a $7 million Central Park West apartment and a $6.3 million estate in Old Westbury, LI — often let Asher “drive others to and from school, and on the day of the tragic accident inappropriately left the keys to the subject motor vehicle accessible to his son.”
Nova and his parents are seeking unspecified damages.
Jay Goldman has had his share of headaches. The feds slapped him with $21,000 tax lien, and his firm, J. Goldman & Co., got caught up in massive SEC insider trading probe of SAC Capital Advisors as investigators tried to learn if information was leaked to the hedge fund.
The Goldmans did not return calls for comment, and Jay Goldman’s lawyer, Eric Franz, said he couldn’t comment.