A New Jersey man who killed two World Cup fans in a hit-and-run in Newark on Saturday has turned himself in to police.

Mariana Elizabeth Valverde Beltran, 58, and Maria Isabel DeLosAngeles Salgado Ayala, 61, were walking home from a World Cup watch party when they were killed in a hit-and-run.

The 2 women were in the middle of the intersection at Park Avenue and North 7th Street when a driver, later identified as 26-year-old David J. Zapata-Vera, barreled through the intersection and struck the women, sending them airborne. The driver did not stop to render aid, the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office said.

Two women were struck and killed in Newark Saturday night by a driver who did not stop after the crash. More: https://t.co/d8Mc6sl6mO pic.twitter.com/vIjgwqnOps

— Eyewitness News (@ABC7NY) June 23, 2026

Firefighters from a nearby fire station rushed over to try and help the women. They were transported to a hospital, where they were pronounced dead.

One witness said Zapata-Vera stepped on the gas and sped through the crosswalk as the traffic light was changing from yellow to red. “I don’t know if he was drunk, but anyway, he put the gas and that’s what happens,” Manuel Candelaria told WABC.

Relatives of the two women are in the process of contacting their family members in Ecuador.

“My dad is managing his emotions with trying to contact everyone in Ecuador, her sisters, her son,” Beltran’s cousin, Jeffrey Chacon, told WABC.

He had a message for the hit-and-run driver: “You have to live with this for the rest of your life. I hope the person is found but also for that person it’s something you have to live with for the rest of your life, it’s on your conscience.”