The Brooklyn teen who slammed into and killed another Jet Ski rider as they were wave-running in Mill Basin was cleared of all charges yesterday.
A jury deliberated five days before it acquitted Aristotle Plagianakos, 19, who was the first person in the city to be prosecuted for manslaughter in connection with a boating accident.
“I am grateful to my lawyers and this jury. It has been three very long years. I look forward to moving on,” Plagianakos said after the verdict in Brooklyn Supreme Court.
Plagianakos’ defense lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, said the jurors “were able to cut through layers and layers of emotion and decided the case on the facts.”
The jury rejected prosecutors’ claims that Plagianakos was speeding through the waters off Mill Basin on June 30, 2006, and recklessly slammed into another Jet Ski piloted by Paul Zaccaria, 17, who died on the spot.