On Thursday, San Francisco police officers arrested a 21-year-old suspected of driving the car that killed Binod Budhathoki in Bernal Heights last weekend in a hit-and-run.
Officers with the Mission District police station arrested Perla Rosario Henriquez Ulloa on Oct. 9, according to the police department. They booked her into jail at 6 p.m. on Thursday on suspicion of felony hit-and-run, driving over the speed limit, destroying evidence, and other charges, according to booking logs.
She was still in jail as of Friday evening, according to booking logs.
Henriquez Ulloa allegedly drove what witnesses said was a silver sedan at high speeds down Cortland Avenue, the main commercial thoroughfare in Bernal, at around 2 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 4. Video from a store on the street showed the sedan speeding down the road just before a loud thud.
The victim, Budhathoki, was Nepali and returning home from celebrating Dashain, a Hindu festival observed throughout South Asia. He had an 8-year-old daughter, according to a GoFundMe in his honor.
The hit-and-run prompted an outcry on Cortland from residents and merchants, who said the avenue is dangerous, and called for traffic-calming improvements from the city. Cortland is on the city’s most recent map of high-injury corridors, and pedestrians were killed by vehicles on the road in 2024 and 2018.
“If we do not mobilize to prioritize Cortland as the high-injury corridor that it is, it will not be the last,” Supervisor Jackie Fielder, who represents Bernal, said at a community meeting this week.
A shirt signed by friends and neighbors adorned a stop sign in makeshift memorial earlier this week, near where Budhathoki was killed.
How sad that a reckless and uncaring woman not only ran over someone but did not even stop to help him. She left a child without a father and a wife without her husband. I hope she understands just what a terrible thing she has done-and made worse with her actions subsequently. Sending caring thoughts to the family of Binod Budhathoki,
Possibly she was afraid of the incident being used to deport her or her family members? (And this is not defending the crime obviously but) most people who have serious accidents and flee the scene do so out of fear. The consequences are often devastating not only for the victim of the crash but also the guilty party. It’s true that it makes their situation worse, but they don’t process that fact. They think they can make it go away like a bad dream. Almost always they are mistaken. In this heightened deportation schema I can actually understand someone being so afraid of untold consequences that they let fear take over their actions in the moment. Some will hate on me for having compassion for the “guilty” party – we are all people. People make mistakes, sometimes with tragic consequences for all involved. Teach the difference, you can’t punish away bad judgment before it happens.
I am flummoxed but not surprised by Jackie Fielder’s sudden concern for the safety of Bernal pedestrians. I have written her office at least three times and called more about speeding traffic down Virginia and drivers failing to stop at stop signs. NO RESPONSE. And now a person is dead. Fielder’s hypocrisy is sickening in the extreme
So because she has not responded to you, in particular, out of the tens of thousands of constituents she has, she therefore doesn’t care?
I’ve emailed her office several times about traffic calming in Bernal and have also been ignored.
I would ignore a crank too on general policy.
One supervisor isn’t in charge of that nomatter how many pointless letters or nastygrams you write to her.
They caught the hit and run perpetrator.
Feel free to use this incident to punish all working people in the name of “environmentalism” or whatever BS Engardioesque lie you are paid to promote.
But it changes nothing real.
“Feel free to use this incident to punish all working people in the name of “environmentalism” or whatever BS Engardioesque lie you are paid to promote.”
Uh.
What?
They’re referring to the WalkSF scammers capitalizing on every such event like this for more funding and ‘disruption’, though like this event the vast majority can’t be prevented by bollards or road paint, or other stupid wastes of money they dictate nonsensically.
Amen. One tragedy is useful to them. Three is a Godsend.
What happened to Budhathoki is terrible. And it is not indicative of the real problem with Cortland. I drive Cortland all the time. Throughout the day, Cortland is full of foot traffic. People moving back and forth across the street as they shop, eat, or bring their kids to martial arts class. It’s a vibrant street. It’s also the corridor between Bayshore and Mission, which means lots of cars are moving through the area. These things are connected. Stores open on streets with car access. Pedestrians are in those spaces because there are stores. Making it hard to drive fast would solve a lot. But placing traffic lights and creating long lines of cars will hurt the community more than help.
They caught the guy who was responsible. Period. Wait for the rest of us to be punished for her mindless crime, because bicycle lobby.