Argentine visitors describe Hudson River bike path attack that killed their friends on celebratory NYC trip- NYDN by Molly Crane

 Ten high school friends from Argentina traveled to New York for several

 days of fun — but only five went home after accused terrorist Sayfullo

 Saipov ran them down with a rented truck, witnesses at Saipov’s trial recounted Wednesday.

“We were celebrating 30 years since we graduated, 35 years since we knew each other, and there were some birthdays we were celebrating,” Juan Pablo Trevisan testified. 

Juan Pablo Trevisan testifying about seeing his friends before they were hit by the truck that Sayfullo Saipov was driving at 60 mph down the bike path. Artwork by Elizabeth Williams 

One of the birthdays was his own, Trevisan said.Trevisan and his friends were cycling in pairs on the Hudson River Park bike path between Watts and Vestry Sts. on Oct. 31, 2017, when prosecutors say Saipov sped his rented trick along the bike lane.

Juan Pablo Trevisan describing the attack on the bike path. 

As Trevisan reached an arm out and asked one of his friends to stop and wait up, he heard a loud thumping noise. “At that moment, the pickup truck [hit] my arm and my wrist, and there was a sign that was dragging that came off and hit my arm.”

Another member of the Argentine group, Martin Marro, recalled a fellow surviving friend tending to him as he bled profusely on the sidewalk.

Martin Marro testifying about the injuries he sustained after being hit by the truck while riding a Citibike on the Hudson River Bike Path. 
Artwork by Elizabeth Williams

“He said to stay calm, that he was there to take care of me and to protect me and to make sure that I wouldn’t drown in my own blood,” Marro said, adding that among other serious injuries he sustained were fractures to his skull, brain and eye socket.

Trevisan and Marro told their stories on the third day of evidence and arguments at Saipov’s federal death penalty trial.

After the men spoke, federal prosecutors showed the jury photos of the victims’ covered bodies.

Sayfullo Saipov watching witnesses testify 1/11/23

Slaughtered were Hernan Diego Mendoza, Alejandro Damian Pagnucco, Ariel Erlij, Hernan Ferruchi and Diego Enrique Angelini.

Also killed were Darren Drake, a 32-year-old from New Jersey, and 23-year-old Nicholas Cleves of New York.

Jurors on Tuesday heard from the devastated loved ones of a 31-year-old mother of two, Ann-Laure Decadt, of Belgium, killed as she rode with her two sisters and mom.