ATV rider who crashed into 64-year-old Yorktown man pleads guilty

A 21-year-old Yorktown resident who drove his all-terrain vehicle into a 64-year-old man who was trying to keep ATVs off a town ballfield pleaded guilty Wednesday to a lesser assault charge.

Kyle Frankild pleaded guilty to second-degree assault in Westchester County Court after he was promised a probationary sentence that includes six months in the county jail.

Frankild acknowledged on questioning by Assistant District Attorney Jonathan Strongin that he recklessly caused serious injury by driving his ATV into the victim, Ed Moffett, at Hunterbrook Field on Aug. 27, 2023. He had initially been charged with first-degree assault, which would have subjected him to a minimum of five years in state prison.

State Supreme Court Justice Larry Schwartz accepted the guilty plea and scheduled sentencing for Oct. 16.

Frankild had been riding around with a group of teenagers that afternoon when Moffett came out of his home next door to get them to leave. Moffett said he grabbed a stick, either for his own protection because the group was so large or to convince them to leave, but put it down before speaking with a dirt-bike rider. He said he told the boy that the group was messing up the field and there were other places where they should ride.

"He understood, said he wouldn't do it again and that's the last thing I remember," said Moffett, who was then hit from behind by Frankild.

All the ATV and dirt-bike riders fled and Moffett said he was fortunate that his wife came out to check on him.

He was hospitalized with a badly broken leg, broken ribs and a traumatic brain injury, but was able to make his daughter's wedding in Texas later that week. Frankild was also treated at a hospital for a head injury.

Moffett said he was fine with the plea deal, saying it was Frankild's first offense.

"I didn't think him going to prison would help," he said. "I just hope he gets the help he needs and returns as a productive member of society."

Moffett's injury led to proposed legislation to regulate ATVs and electric bikes in the town. He spoke out in favor of it in the spring but the Town Board has yet to enact new legislation.