Male Sentenced in El Monte, California Road Racing Car Accident

An El Monte person has been sentenced to a person 12 months in county jail and 5 a long time on probation for his purpose in a street racing related car accident previous 12 months in which his buddy was killed and the passenger in the other car significantly injured.

In Oct 2007, 19-12 months-outdated Fitzgerald Paragas experienced been racing with his buddy eighteen-12 months-outdated Brian Ramirez. Just prior to that, they experienced been looking at the street racing film “The Speedy and the Furious” and made a decision to have a race of their personal. As the two continued to race on the streets, Brian dropped control of his car. His Mitsubishi careened across the median and into incoming traffic. A Volkswagen Jetta carrying the Saavedra family was coming in the opposite route, and the Mitsubishi crashed into it. Ramirez was killed instantaneously, even though the Saavedra family experienced really serious injuries. At the time of the crash, Ramirez’s vehicle was seemingly likely at ninety mph.

After the crash, Paragas attempted to mislead police into believing that he experienced not been part of the car accident at all. His preliminary assert was that he was at residence at the time of the car crash, and experienced acquired a simply call from Ramirez who said he would be coming in excess of. After waiting around for an hour, when there was nevertheless no indication of his buddy, Paragas instructed police he experienced driven off to choose a glimpse. It was then that he arrived on the car crash internet site exactly where his buddy was killed. Afterwards even so, Paragas broke down, and admitted that he experienced been racing as well.

He was billed with a person felony depend of murder with the distinctive allegation of resulting in fantastic bodily personal injury, a person felony depend of vehicular manslaughter and 4 counts of felony reckless driving resulting in personal injury, as properly as misdemeanor street racing. A decide has now sentenced him to a person 12 months in county jail. He will also be necessary to pay back restitution to the Saavedra family, a $100 court stability payment and a $20 restitution payment. He is also prohibited from driving even though beneath probation, and will have to take part in a safe and sound driving system. He will also be necessary to educate large university college students on safe and sound driving as part of his sentence. The decide admitted that Paragas’ lack of a prior legal document and letters composed to the decide by the young man’s university academics experienced led to what can only be identified as a gentle sentence.

The district legal professional requested the decide to impose a 4-12 months jail sentence to be suspended. If Paragas violates the phrases of his probation, he would have to serve time in jail. Paragas was experiencing a optimum of eight a long time and eight months, and the prosecution experienced requested for a sentence of 4 a long time to 6 a long time.

Road racing can be both spontaneous races, like the a person that seems to have taken area right here, or coordinated races that are prepared forward of time. In both scenario, they can induce really serious injuries and fatalities. With the large speeds that are the norm throughout these types of races, numerous motorists’ lives are endangered only due to the fact they ended up unlucky sufficient to be all over the scene when a race was on. Considering the gravity of Paragas’ motion and the loss of life that it resulted in, a stiffer sentence would have provided out a more powerful information to would-be street racers.