The family of a man killed in a drunk driving crash is getting closure.
“He said, Oh my god Maria, watch!” Then all of a sudden she hit us," Maria Vernon told Channel 11.
Those are the last words Maria heard from her husband Mike Vernon, as she was driving him to the hospital on Freeport Road in January of 2024.
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“He hit the windshield, and he just died on my shoulder,” she said.
For the next two hours that night, Maria sat next to her husband, who had just died, as crews worked to rescue them.
“They cut the roof open on my car and took Mike out. I do remember that, them taking him out, then them taking me out. It was horrible. It was just horrible to see that,” she added.
The woman who caused that deadly accident is Alyssa Galiano. She had been drinking at Nox’s Tavern with her 7-month-old baby in a car seat on the bar. She then drove with her blood alcohol level at nearly 3x the legal limit.
Today, a judge sentenced Galiano to 2.5-5 years in prison as part of a plea deal.
“When they told me about that, I said, I don’t want her to go to jail for 20 years. When they said 2.5 to 5, I said that’s fine,” Maria said.
Almost two years after the crash, Maria still walks with a cane and has constant pain throughout her body.
But — she says the physical pain is nothing compared to the loss of her husband of almost 25 years.
“He was so sweet. He would do anything for me. I just loved him,” she said.
Galiano also had an opportunity to address the courtroom. She apologized to the Vernons and took full accountability for the deadly crash.
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