Barbanti found guilty in fatal hit-and-run

SALEM – A jury convicted a 25-year-old Saugus woman for a fatal 2010 hit-and-run, deciding the case only a few hours after the defendant denied being involved in the incident and said damage to her car’s windshield was due to a fallen tree branch, not striking a pedestrian.”(The defendant) gave a long list of convenient excuses for everything,” Essex Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Kirshenbaum said in her closing argument Thursday. “I would suggest she is covering her tracks today, just like she did on Jan. 28, 2010.”A jury found Steffany Barbanti, 25, guilty of leaving the scene of personal injury/death in the Jan. 28, 2010 hit-and-run that killed Christos Agganis, 81, as he crossed Central Street in Saugus to visit his family’s restaurant.Sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 16, and Barbanti was taken into custody after the verdict.”We just want to thank the district attorney, the Saugus Police and everybody for all their hard work and effort,” said Peter Politis, Agganis’ nephew and a witness to the accident. “We’re just glad to know our uncle can rest in peace now.”The verdict concludes a case that appeared to have gone cold until police received an anonymous tip in January 2012 that directed police to Barbanti’s former best friend, Jessica Prizio.Prizio testified Tuesday that Barbanti said she thought she might have hit somebody in downtown Saugus when the women met at the Prizio home on the night of the crash.Prizio testified Barbanti also said she was texting at the time of the accident and refused to return to the scene.Barbanti told Prizio and other witnesses her car’s damaged windshield was due to a tree branch falling on the car.Barbanti took the stand Thursday morning and insisted she did not hit Agganis and was not even driving at the time of the accident.Barbanti also said a branch had fallen onto her car and damaged her windshield when she visited the Prizios’ house a week before the accident – not the night of the accident. She said she had been stopped by a police officer on the morning of the 28th and heeded his advice not to drive because of the damage.Defense Attorney Alfred Farese Jr. also repeatedly focused during the trial that a witness told police of a small dark SUV leaving the scene of the accident while Barbanti drives a white Acura sedan.In closing statements just before noon Thursday, both Kirshenbaum and Farese touched on several witnesses’ testimony in support of their respective cases.But both also alluded to the importance of Prizio and Barbanti’s testimonies, asking jurors to consider the motive and character of the opposing side’s key witness.Farese told jurors Prizio ended the women’s friendship in 2011 when Barbanti didn’t show up for their plans to celebrate Barbanti’s birthday.He asked jurors to consider what Prizio “is capable of” when police asked her about a fatal hit-and-run accident, “if she’s capable of taking a 10-year friendship and throwing it out the window over a birthday date.””Saugus PD got hooked, got hooked badly by Jessica Prizio, and discarded all the evidence that would point to the real perpetrator,” Farese said. “(Prizio’s) mother doesn’t back up her story, nobody else backs up her story, there’s no other witness to indicate to you that Barbanti was involved.”Kirshenbaum said Barbanti’s testimony – although given voluntarily – was “to be scrutinized in the same light” as the testimonies of other witnesses.Kirshenbaum suggested “a note of panic” in listing Barbanti’s calls – and often multiple calls – to people including Prizio, the Prizio home, Prizio’s mother, Prizio’s sister, auto-repair and auto-glass repair shops for roughly three hours following the time of the accident.Kirshenbaum noted an expert witness testified the windshield damage was consistent with striking a pedestrian.”The only person that Jessica Prizio covered for or lied for in this investigation was this defendant,” Kirshenbaum said, noting how Prizio didn’t tell her story until confronted by Saugu