Dave Salovesh was a longtime advocate in D.C.’s tight knit biking community,

Karen Ramsey

The man who struck and killed longtime D.C. bike advocate Dave Salovesh in April pleaded guilty on Tuesday morning to voluntary manslaughter in the death, court records show.

Twenty-five-year-old Robert Little admitted in court to killing Salovesh on April 19, 2019 at the intersection of 12th Street and Florida Avenue NE. He was barreling down Florida Avenue in a stolen Dodge Caravan after fleeing a traffic stop, according to a police affidavit. Little ran a red light on 12th Street, hit a blue Hyundai, and then careened to the wrong side of the road, where he struck Salovesh, who was waiting for a traffic signal on 12th Street NE.

After Little hit Salovesh, he continued traveling west, eventually striking a tree and pinning Salovesh between his vehicle and the tree. Salovesh suffered “severe crushing trauma” and died on the scene, according to the police affidavit.

Police initially charged Little with second degree murder while armed, but downgraded the charge to voluntary manslaughter as a part of a plea deal. The judge will sentence Little at a hearing on September 27.

Salovesh was a well-known and beloved advocate for cyclist safety in the District. Other cycling advocates, many of them his friends, have called on the District Department of Transportation to make safety changes to the area where Salovesh was killed, as another pedestrian also died there in 2013 and two children were killed by a driver fleeing police in 2004.

DDOT implemented some changes to Florida Avenue NE over the past weekend, with construction slated in 2021 for long term solutions like reducing the number of lanes on the street and adding better bike and pedestrian access.

Rudi Riet, an advocate for Jump bikes who befriended Salovesh at a weekly bicycling coffee club, told DCist in April that Salovesh “wanted everybody to have their safe way to get from point A to point B in something other than a car. He was really trying to make the street safe for everyone.”

Riet also said that Salovesh “loved good music, he loved good jokes, he loved a good beer. He was a guy who has a wicked sense of humor and the most caring hug.” Salovesh was 54 years old.  He moved to D.C. in 1997, and worked in IT for the last ten years at the National Law Enforcement Officer Memorial Fund. He lived in Capitol Hill with his common-law wife, Jean DeStefano, and their 16-year-old daughter.

This story has been updated to clarify that officers were not in active pursuit of Robert Little when he struck Dave Salovesh, and to include additional biographical information about Salovesh.  

Filed Under: bicyclists, cyclist death, dave salovesh, vision zero,