NEWBURGH – The funeral service for the Newburgh taxi driver who was gunned down while on duty last week, was held on Saturday.
Family and friends of Jorge “Coky” Arbayza De La Cruz, 51, are still looking for answers regarding his murder.
De La Cruz, who was part of a family of taxi drivers, was described as being very hard-working and respected. A group of his co-workers attended his funeral wearing shirts dedicated to his memory emblazoned with his nickname, and his image. His coworkers spoke very highly of him.
Anthony Benitez, De La Cruz’s coworker of five years at Express USA Taxi, said De La Cruz was a mentor, a good friend to him and is sorely missed.
“There was times where we would hang out after work, have a drink or two, usually on the weekends – Fridays and Saturdays – talk about the day and what’s going on,” said Benitez. “He would call me every afternoon and around the nighttime, ask if I ate. ‘Oh, you didn’t eat. Let’s go have some tacos.’ Just a lot of good memories,” he said.
De La Cruz’s family and friends are hoping the tragedy that befell him will encourage the city to increase protections for drivers and police protection for city residents in general.
Mario Arbayza, De La Cruz’s brother who put up a $15,000 reward last week for information leading to the arrest of the shooters, said taxi drivers being of the many essential workers during the pandemic helping the city through, deserve more protection and hopes this situation won’t happen to someone else. The federal ATF kicked in $,5000 to the reward.
“We don’t want this to happen again to somebody because the taxi drivers are working hard,” said Arbayza. “They need more security in the city, in general for the whole community we need more safety. This is more important for everybody in the City of Newburgh,” he said.
To raise awareness for the investigation into De La Cruz’s murder and for safety within the city, a march from 144 North Miller Street to the city’s police station will be held Thursday at 11a.m.
