HUMC Crisis Counselor Killed in Wrong Way Crash Had Been Day Drinking at Beach Bar, Cops Say

A crisis counselor at Hoboken University Medical Center who was killed on Aug. 16 in a wrong way collision on Route 18 South had been drinking for hours at a bar in Point Pleasant Beach prior to the accident, police said Wednesday.

Ashley Chieco, 26, began drinking at Martell’s Tiki Bar on the Point Pleasant Beach boardwalk before noon on the day of the accident and had not eaten all day, NJ.com reported. 

The Wood-Ridge resident, who spent the day at the beach with a co-worker, left the boardwalk bar alone around 5 p.m. and drove off in a Hyundai Tucson SUV that was not her own, police said. The SUV, which was reported stolen by its owner, looked similar to Chieco’s car, police said. Its owner told police she had left the keys in the ignition at the request of valet attendants, NJ.com reported.

Approximately an hour after leaving the bar, Chieco, driving the stolen car the wrong way on Route 18 South, crashed head-on into a BMW driven by Dana Corrar, 55, who was returning home from her nursing job in Ewing Township, police said.

Corrar and Chieco were both taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where Chieco later died.

Corrar broke both of her legs and ankles and suffered injuries to her cervix, spine and punctured a lung as a result of the crash. She remains hospitalized in serious condition and has undergone at least three surgeries, NJ.com reported.

Chieco, who was born in Hoboken and is survived by her parents and sister, taught psychology at Bergen Community College and worked as supervisor of the Mental Health Unit at the Mental Health Association in New York City in addition to her crisis counseling role at Hoboken University Medical Center, according to her obituary.