Every bit helps.
Friends and family of the Sunset Park woman who died in a freak car accident on Aug. 20 are raising money to help raise her toddler son.
The child’s father was driving when the victim died, and police are charging him with drunk driving, manslaughter, and leaving the scene — leaving their 2-year-old son Andrew in his grandparents’ care with an uncertain future, a friend of the family said.
“The family isn’t loaded, and now they’re going to have to raise the child, so we really just want to help them out and make sure that little Andrew is taken care of,” said Morgan Ricca-Lucenti, who has been close friends with victim Danielle Aronsen for 15 years.
Aronsen died after she was flung from a car on Fifth Avenue at 11:26 pm on Aug. 20.
Aronsen and her boyfriend were leaving a bar in Bay Ridge that Thursday evening, police said. The boyfriend was driving on Fifth Avenue with Aronsen in the back seat when he turned onto Bay Ridge Parkway, a police report states. The back door was not secured, and Aronsen went flying out of the car, hitting her head, officials said.
Emergency medical services took Aronsen to Lutheran Medical Center, where doctors pronounced her dead, police said.
The boyfriend’s attorney could not be reached for comment.
Aronsen was a mainstay in the Southern Brooklyn music scene, but lately, her attention was laser-focused on her toddler son, Ricca-Lucenti said.
“Any cover band that’s in Bay Ridge — I’m sure at least one member knew Danielle,” she said. “In our early years we liked to go out and party. Ever since she had her kid, everything has been about the baby. So lately I’ve been going out to lunch with her and the baby, going shopping with her and the baby.”
Ricca-Lucenti has conflicted feelings about the boyfriend, who dated Aronsen for more than a decade, because she knew the pair quarreled, she said.
“It’s hard not to be angry and blame him when I’m reading everything I have,” Ricca-Lucenti said. “[He] was a sweet guy and very helpful, but he could get a little crazy at times. They would fight on an off a lot, but nothing like this had ever happened.”
Aronsen’s cousin started a crowd-funding campaign the day after her death to help the family.
The page has raised more than $9,000 from more than 100 people since it was created on Aug. 21.
And area bands are organizing benefit shows to raise money for Aronsen’s family, said Gravesend guitarist Paul Lucenti, Ricca-Lucenti’s husband.
“That kid is going to need all the money he can to have a nice future,” Lucenti said.
To donate, go to www.gofundme.com/9c2f69sb. Lucenti is throwing a benefit concert with metal acts Exzakked, Red Rum, and Wildhearted Sons at Lucky 13 Saloon (644 Sackett St. between Third and Fourth avenues in Gowanus) on Oct. 9 at 9 pm.
