Driver sentenced for Fife wreck that killed a 77-year-old woman visiting family
A man was sentenced Wednesday for a Fife wreck that killed a 77-year-old woman last year.
Keith Brian Hamilton Jr. pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide last month for the crash that killed Lydia Ramirez.
The 33-year-old also pleaded guilty to unlawful drug possession and felony driving under the influence.
Superior Court Judge Jerry Costello gave him a high-end sentence of two years, 10 months in prison, which is what the state and defense recommended.
Loved ones told the court at sentencing that Ramirez was the matriarch of their family.
She constantly kept in touch with her seven children and her grandchildren and great grandchildren, including a long-lost child with whom she’d finally been able to reconnect, they said.
Ramirez, from California, was visiting Tacoma for the birth of a great grandchild and to take care of a daughter following a surgery.
That daughter, Cindy Bayamon, was driving with her mother when, charging papers say, Hamilton turned in front of the vehicle Sept. 28 in the 4500 block of Pacific Highway East. Tests showed he had alcohol, methamphetamine and amphetamine in his system, according to court records.
Ramirez later died from her injuries at a hospital.
Bayamon described to the court the trauma of the crash, and how the sight of her mother after is something she’ll never forget.
“I hope you learn something from this,” she told Hamilton.
The family said they miss Ramirez’s phone calls and having barbecues and parties with her.
“She made sure she heard our voice, and that we were all OK,” daughter Debbie Ochoa, who attended the sentencing remotely, told the court.
They also miss her hugs and cooking and how she always made sure she sang to them on their birthdays, the family said.
Ramirez was always joking, daughter Marie Montoya told the judge.
At 4-feet-11 and 125 pounds, “she was tiny, but spunky,” Montoya said. “... Her love was unconditional.”
Defense attorney Naomi Simila-Dickinson told the court her client is committed to getting substance abuse treatment and that he is extremely remorseful for what happened.
She read the court a statement from Hamilton that said as much.
He wrote about how he’d turned to drugs and alcohol and how he should have “dealt with the past instead of drowning it.” He also wrote about how he hopes others can learn from his situation.
Before handing down the sentence, Costello said: “This is awful all around. ... A 77-year-old matriarch who, as I’m told, had a wonderful life. Has raised terrific children. This is a — words cannot adequately even begin to describe the pain.”
He wished he’d known her, he said.
