NYC serial killer handyman staged car crash in 2019 insurance scam: lawsuit

The Brooklyn handyman who confessed to slaying three elderly women in his NYCHA building once staged a car crash in an insurance scam, according to a lawsuit.

Kevin Gavin, 66, and two others faked a Brooklyn crash so they could split $150,000 in payouts earmarked for medical treatments, according to a state Supreme Court lawsuit filed in November.

Gavin was riding in the backseat of a 2002 Mercedes on Dec. 19, 2019 when the vehicle slammed into a woman pulling out of a driveway on a snowy-covered Canarsie street, according to the suit.

The woman claimed the Mercedes, driven by 31-year-old owner Pedro Joint, veered into the driveway to hit her car, somehow missing the cars on both sides of the driveway, court papers said.

NYPD cops took an accident report and Joint filed an insurance claim with Nationwide Insurance, noting that he, Gavin and passenger Sierra Simmons, 23, were injured.

Nationwide filed a lawsuit against Joint, Gavin and Simmons after concluding that the car crash was “the product of a staged and/or intentional event,” court documents said.

The company also sued 23 medical practices the trio allegedly sought for treatment, including various acupuncturists and physical therapists.

During an interview with insurance investigators, Gavin claimed didn’t know Joint or Simmons. But he did admit that he saw them both at different doctors’ offices, the lawsuit said.

The NYCHA handyman said the three of them was going to a house party where Simmons had asked him to DJ.

Joint asked both him and Simmons to sit in the backseat, because he was going to pick up a third person. The crash happened before the third person was picked up, Gavin said, according to the suit.

Litigation was still pending this week when NYPD detectives charged Gavin on Thursday with killing a trio of senior citizens at the Woodson Houses in Brownsville.

All three victims — Myrtle McKinney, 82, Jacolia James, 83, and Juanita “Jenny” Caballero, 78 — often relied on Gavin for help around their homes before the suspect turned murderous, cops said.

McKinney was killed in 2015. James was murdered four years later. Caballero was strangled with a telephone cord on Jan. 15, police said.

Gavin was ordered held without bail at a Brooklyn Criminal Court arraignment Friday.

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