GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Gwinnett County police say bodycam video shows a woman who was driving with drugs in her car and drunk and sleep-deprived.
“‘Are you okay?’” I’m okay, sir,” Sonal Nandkishor Patel could be heard answering in the video.
Patel, who spoke to police moments after a deadly crash, is accused of being impaired and falling asleep on an interstate.
Gwinnett police say she caused the crash that killed 29-year-old Omar Ortiz a week after he moved to the U.S. from Cuba.
“He came to give a great future to the kids, that’s why he came here,” said Ortiz’s aunt-in-law, Leticia Almaguer.
Police say 40-year-old Patel was behind the wheel of another car while drunk, in possession of cocaine and while sleep-deprived.
Ortiz died at the scene.
“His girl and his boy are going to grow up without a dad,” Almaguer said.
He was a passenger in the car with Almaguer when police say Patel crashed into a car stopped on the interstate near Flowery Branch Road.
It happened as she and Ortiz headed home at around 4 a.m. on February 4.
Patel told police she hadn’t slept in up to two days.
“All that made her stop her vehicle in the middle of a travel lane and caused a severe accident,” Cpl. Juan Madiedo of Gwinnett County Police Department said.
Police arrested Patel that day and then again this past Monday when they got evidence to charge her with DUI and vehicular homicide.
She posted bond twice for the crash despite driving with a suspended license and with a previous DUI arrest in 2007.
“We are very disappointed that she was able to bond out because she is a repeat offender,” Karina Deochand of Karma Injury Law said.
Deochand represents Ortiz’s family.
While Patel is out on bond, Deochand says the fight for justice isn’t over.
“She is on the hook for a life,” Deochand said.
Johnson stopped by the suspect’s house to talk to her but she wasn’t home.
Ortiz’s attorneys say the bond is a disappointment but they’re thankful there’s a chance the driver could face jail time for the homicide charges.
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