Man charged in ramming death at bar

Authorities filed murder charges today against a 35-year-old man, saying he exacted revenge against a takeout clerk who had escorted him out of a Bensalem bar last night by killing him in the parking lot a few minutes later with a pickup truck.

Jose Maldonado-Luzuriaga was sent to the Bucks County prison on homicide and related charges this morning after failing to post $3 million bail in the death of William Sullo III of Philadelphia, said First Assistant District Attorney David Zellis.

Maldonado-Luzuriaga had been drinking heavily before he set foot into Salute Restaurant Bar on Knights Road around 10:22 last night, authorities allege in investigative documents released today.

So bartenders refused to serve him and gave him a glass of water, officials said.

A short time later one of those bartenders, with help from Sullo, removed him from the premises because they had spotted him drinking beer that had been slipped to him by a fellow patron, authorities said.

Zellis said Maldonado-Luzuriaga, an illegal immigrant from Ecuador who lived up the road from the Salute bar, got into a white 2006 Ford F150, circled the lot a few times, aimed the pickup toward the front of the bar and gunned in anger toward Sullo, who stood on the curb watching.

Sullo, 30, of Philadelphia, died after being pinned against the exterior wall of the bar while the bartender-bouncer standing next to him, Carl Slaton, Jr., jumped out of harm's way just in time, authorities said.

Slaton was one of the two bartenders who originally refused to serve Maldonado-Luzuriaga. He also helped remove the man from the bar with Sullo's help, authorities said. Maldonado-Luzuriaga later told investigators that he had been angry with the two men, authorities said.

"Clearly, he was aiming the truck at both of them," Zellis said. "It's just by the grace of God that Mr. Slaton was able to get out of the way."

Zellis said Maldonado-Luzuriaga told investigators that he had been living in the United States as an illegal immigrant for five or six years but that little else was known about his background, work status or family.

He also told investigators he had drunk five Corona beers before the crash, authorities said.

After bar employees refused to serve him alcohol and their backs were turned on him, some fellow Hispanic patrons apparently gave him a drink, officials said.

A smattering of those patrons would later follow him out of the bar. They argued with him in the parking lot before he got into the truck, authorities said.

Zellis said that the job of informing federal authorities about the suspect's immigration status was being left to Bensalem police but that prosecutors would press forward with their case against Maldonado-Luzuriaga. A preliminary hearing should take place in the next 10 days, Zellis said.

"We will be in touch with the federal authorities," Zellis said, "but that's not going to deter us from fully prosecuting him according to the law."

Maldonado-Luzuriaga is charged with criminal homicide, attempted homicide, reckless endangerment and causing death while being an unlicensed driver.

Investigators said the truck did not belong to the suspect.

The Philadelphia Medical Examiner's Office was conducting an autopsy today on Sullo, who was pronounced dead at Frankford Hospital in Torresdale.