By REBECCA ROSENBERG
Posted: 3:42 am
July 4, 2008
Call it di-vine intervention. A taxi smashed into a Midtown wine store yesterday - just missing a wheelchair-bound man, police and stunned witnesses said.
The cab was headed north on First Avenue, with a silver VW assigned to a Dominican Republic diplomat to its right, just south of East 54th Street. Neither vehicle had a passenger.
The cabby tried to make a right turn onto 54th in front of the other car when he was hit from behind at about 1:10 p.m., witnesses said.
The cab smashed into the window of First Avenue Vintner.
"I heard the taxi come straight at the window. The glass went everywhere," said one employee. "All the bottles were broken on the ground."
The wheelchair-bound man, Wiley Hanze, 84, escaped injury - but not by much.
"The cab came about six feet from me," said Hanze, a retired TV producer.
No charges were filed.
