Drunk Driver Sentencing Initiates Holiday Party Season

Details

Category: Crime

Published on Thursday, 06 December 2018 07:07

Written by Janet Walker

A Los Angeles women received the maximum sentence of thirty years to life after admitting her culpability in a drunk driving accident that killed her sister, another passenger and a three generations of another family.

Olivia Carolee Culbreath, 26, acknowledged her guilt and remorse as she entered the plea just as the trial was beginning Wednesday, December 5, 2018.

Culbreath drove the wrong way, northbound on a southbound lane and then eastbound on the westbound lanes of two major California freeways before plowing head on into a Ford Explorer carrying three generations.

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Killed in the worst crash in California State history were George Mejia-Martinez, 47, Leticia Ibarra, 42; their daughter Jessica Mejia, 20; and her grandmother, Ester Delgado, 80.

Also killed were Culbreath's sister Maya, 24, a friend, Kristin Young, 21. Culbreath was injured and placed under arrest immediately. She was arraigned after the May 2014 crash on a stretcher and since has been attending court proceedings in a wheelchair.

With more than one previous DUI convictions, before the February 2014 slaughter, Culbreath was warned that if she was involved in another DUI accident she would face murder charges.

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Defense attorneys had submitted a sentencing recommendation of 15 years to life, which Superior Court Judge Lisa B. Lench rejected and instead imposed the maximum sentence allowed, thirty years to life.

After the sentencing, which defense attorneys called "extremely harsh" they indicated the California Patrol "could have saved all these lives had they responded to the 911 calls." The records indicate the wrong way erratically driving 2013 Chevrolet Camaro had been reported by several early morning callers.

The prosecutors countered these allegations by indicating, Culbreath had just taken responsibility for this horrific act, and asked why the victim who claimed true remorse would attempt to place blame on others for failing to stop her actions.

Culbreath, who was 21 at the time of the accident, will be eligible for parole in 25 years in 2043.

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With the holiday party season quickly approaching don't let anyone drink and drive. Call Uber, Lyft, a taxi, take the keys, risk the rage, of one who has had too much to drink, and take the keys.