Almost a year ago exactly, yet another drunk-driving illegal alien killed another American citizen. This time, it was Sarasota, Fla., and the vehicular killer will spend 13 years behind bars.
It’s a small price to pay for 26-year-old Daniel Garcia, the blotto border jumper who will be 12 years younger when he emerges from jail than Pamila Yoder, the 51-year-old wife and mother he killed without a moment’s thought of what might happen if he got behind the wheel.
Mrs. Yoder was on her way home. Thanks to an illegal alien who shouldn’t have been here, she’s dead.
Illegal Mexican
Garcia pleaded guilty to DUI manslaughter for killing Yoder. He was driving a Ford Club Wagon Van, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported, when he flew through a red light, hitting three other automobiles, including the Ford 150 pick-up in which Yoder was riding as a passenger.
Sadly, Yoder’s children, also headed home that fateful Sunday, the newspaper reported, passed the grim, mangled wreckage, but didn’t recognize the truck in which their mom was riding. Garcia, of course, didn’t recognize anything. His blood alcohol level was “more than double” the legal limit, the newspaper reported, when he recklessly hurtled through the red light and killed Yoder.
The Herald-Tribune detailed the whole sad day for the Yoder family: “Jesse Yoder, 22, and his sister, Madison, 18, both drove past the crash that happened around 4:30 p.m. at University Parkway and U.S. 301 Sunday afternoon, not realizing their mother had died in the wreck, their father said Monday.” The newspaper continued:
The truck Pamila Yoder was riding in was not too far ahead of Jesse Yoder’s car as they both headed west on University Parkway toward the family home west of Tamiami Trail across from the airport, Daniel Yoder said.
Jesse Yoder “saw the accident,” Daniel Yoder told the newspaper. “He didn’t know it was his mom, because it wasn’t her vehicle.”
Daniel Yoder said his daughter, Madison, called him on her way to the home to ask what was going on at U.S. 301 and University Parkway because the road was closed and traffic was backed up.
About 30 minutes later, the trooper knocked on the door with the bad news.
Garcia Escapes
As is typical with illegal immigrants, Garcia fled. Dressed only in a hospital gown, he waltzed out of the hospital unmolested as if he were going for an afternoon stroll, unworried about the life he had taken.
Fortunately for the Yoder family, the newspaper reported, the man in pursuit was a dogged investigator. Indeed, he was completely unlike the immigration authorities who permitted an illegal-alien in Massachusetts, who witnessed a drunk-driving homicide in Milford., to escape custody and mostly likely flee the country.
Sarasota County Sheriff’s Deputy Brian Barrett, who has never let a fugitive get away, began the pursuit with only Garcia’s driver’s license, the newspaper reported. Four months later, Barrett collared the miscreant Mexican in Gainesville.
Garcia Sentenced
The sentencing on Tuesday, the Herald-Tribune reported, “was a moment Yoder’s children — and some law enforcement officials — thought may never come. … The family had a hard time healing, knowing the man responsible for Yoder’s death was free with no leads on his whereabouts.”
One of Yoder’s daughters was uncompromising in her victim impact statement: “I just wanted you to know my face,” she said. “I will never forget what you did. I hope you never forget either.”
Garcia spoke to the family, the newspaper reported: “I’m very sorry for what happened at the accident. I apologize to the family for causing this accident. You will always be in my prayers that you will move forward in life.”
The family wondered, the newspaper reported, whether he is really sorry, or only sorry he was caught.
Mayhem In Milford
The drunk-driving Mexican in Sarasota is just one of hundreds, if not thousands, of illegals who get behind the wheel and kill, as The New American has repeatedly documented.
Just last month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement permitted an illegal-alien from Ecuador to escape from custody before he was to testify before a grand jury in the vehicular homicide of 23-year-old Matthew Denice in Milford, Mass.
Police say the killer was fellow Ecuadoran illegal Nicolas Guaman, a violent criminal the cops had in custody four times before he mowed down Denice. The escapee, Luis Acosta, police say, witnessed the crime.
A drunken Guaman, police allege, hit Denice, a motorcyclist, and dragged him a quarter-mile before stopping. When Denice finally became dislodged from the truck, police say, Guaman backed over him for good measure, then took off.
So immigration authorities not only did not deport Guaman, which led to the vehicular murder of Denice, but also permitted the witness, Acosta, to escape.
A month before that, police in Massachusetts collared a rather more famous illegal alien. His name was Omar Onyango Obama, uncle to the president of the United States. The hard-drinking Kenyan didn’t kill anyone, but he nearly plowed into a police car.
The elder Obama has been a fugitive from immigration authorities for more than 20 years. The Boston Globe reported that he was “quietly released” from custody.
‘It’s A Cultural Thing’
In 2007, The New American reported extensively on the problem of drunk-driving illegals. Apropos of Garcia’s cultural background, that article cited several articles in the mainstream media that link drunk driving among illegal-alien Mexicans to cultural attitudes about drinking and driving, combined with obvious disregard for the law.
According to The Record of Stockton, Calif., “Approximately 2,000 Latino men like Mercado were arrested in Stockton between 2000 and 2004 on suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol. They accounted for at least 54 percent of all DUI arrests in Stockton.”
“It’s a cultural thing,” a cop told The Record. TNA also noted that other newspapers and Mothers Against Drunk Driving are also candid about Hispanic immigrants and drunk driving.
And how much damage can one illegal immigrant from Mexico do in one evening? As bad as things are for the Yoders, Garcia has nothing on killer Carlos Rudolfo Prieto. He wiped out half of the six-member Ceran clan on Christmas Eve, 2007.
He is serving a sentence of up to 10 years.
