PEKIN (25News Now) - The woman who pleaded guilty to killing two people while driving drunk last spring has been sentenced to 14 years in prison.

Stephanie Melgoza, 24, pleaded guilty to four felony charges: two counts of aggravated DUI death and two counts of aggravated reckless driving. Four other lesser charges were dropped in exchange for the guilty plea.

During the hearing, multiple family members of the victims, Andrea Rosewicz, 43, of Avon, Ohio, and Paul Prowant, 55, of Seattle, Washington, could be seen in the courtroom gallery. One of them was a woman who identified herself as Lisa, Andrea’s cousin. Before the sentencing, she read a victim impact statement to the courtroom, directed specifically at Melgoza.

“Everybody makes mistakes, but not to this degree,” she said through tears, staring at the now-convicted offender.

Melgoza’s defense attorney Kevin Sullivan made one last plea prior to the sentencing, addressing how sorry she really was behind closed doors, despite what the victims’ families said about her demeanor. While on an ankle monitor, Sullivan noted Melgoza had not consumed one drop of alcohol. He noted that she had been vilified on multiple fronts, and while what happened never should have happened, it was “a mistake.”

“She never set out to do this, and she’ll regret it the rest of her life,” he said.

Melgoza herself was allowed to speak, as well, addressing the families directly. She spoke for several minutes, noting several of the more tragic points made by family members and apologizing for her actions multiple times. Before listening to the judge’s decision, she expressed gratitude to her family for their support.

“I never meant to hurt anybody,” she said. “I will live with this for the rest of my life.”

According to East Peoria police reports, on April 10th, 2022, Melgoza was heading to Full Throttle bar in East Peoria, when she ran over the two pedestrians, reportedly walking from the bar.

Melgoza was found at the scene with the Dodge Dart registered to her name. Police reports indicate the car showed heavy front-end damage and quote Melgoza as saying she, “was almost there and suddenly some person walked out in front of her and her car got hit.”

The Tazewell Assistant States Attorney says officers on the scene identified Malgoza as the driver of the Dart. The state says she, “admitted to drinking three vodka drinks prior to driving...” and “striking a person.”

Assistant State’s Attorney Aliesha Graves wrote in the charging affidavit, that the responding officer “noticed the defendant had the strong odor of alcoholic beverage...as well as slurred speech and red, watery eyes.” EPPD bodycam video shows Melgoza did not understand what she had done that night

Melgoza, answering officers’ questions in an uncertain manner and later seeming ignorant to questioning, when taken to OSF St. Francis in Peoria the same night.

The crash happened weeks before Melgoza was set to graduate from Bradley. She was taken off the list of students eligible to walk in the graduation ceremony following student backlash. While she didn’t walk, the president of the school did allow her to accept a diploma.

Melgoza will have to serve a minimum of 85% of her 14 year sentence. She could also get 120 days taken off due to new policies from the SAFE-T Act that allow credits to deduct days from time served depending on if they spent 20 hours or more a day at home. That’s from January 1 of this year, when the act first went into effect.

Copyright 2023 WEEK. All rights reserved.

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