Deer Park nail salon crash driver faces sentencing Wednesday in 4 deaths

The Dix Hills man convicted of murdering four people when he drove drunk into a nail salon in the summer of 2024, is set to be sentenced Wednesday in Suffolk County Court in Riverhead, where he faces a minimum of 25 years to life in prison.

Steven Schwally, 66, was found guilty in June of four counts of second-degree murder, along with manslaughter, aggravated vehicular homicide and DWI charges, for plowing his Chevy Traverse into the Hawaii Nail & Spa on Grand Boulevard in Deer Park on June 28, 2024.

The crash killed salon owner Jiancai “Ken” Chen, 37; employees Yan Xu, 41, and Meizi Zhang, 50; and off-duty NYPD Officer Emilia Rennhack, who was getting her nails done ahead of a colleague’s wedding that night. Nine others were injured, some of whom needed to be rescued from beneath the vehicle.

Prosecutors said Schwally had been boozing for hours before the crash, telling police he had consumed roughly 18 beers overnight and didn’t remember much of the day.

The Suffolk County district attorney’s office argued at trial that Schwally’s actions amounted to depraved indifference to human life rather than a mere accident.

Schwally had not been present for parts of his trial after suffering a heart attack while at the Suffolk County jail. He was not present when the jury read the verdict after two days of deliberations. Prosecutors have said they hope Schwally would be present Wednesday to hear directly from the victims’ families.

The case drew heavy attention from the NYPD community throughout the trial, with members of Rennhack’s 102nd Precinct attending proceedings in support of her family.

_{Top: Defendant Steven Schwally appears for arraignment at First District Court in Central Islip, N.Y., on Monday, July 1, 2024. (James Carbone/Newsday via AP, Pool)}