Wrong-Way I-25 Driver Gets 15 Year Sentence

DENVER (CBS4) - A woman who drove while drunk and caused a wreck that killed a recent Colorado State University graduate last summer will spend 15 years in prison.

Elizabeth Long pleaded guilty in December to charges that included vehicular homicide, several counts of vehicular assault for injuring two other people, leaving the scene of an accident and DUI. On Tuesday she was sentenced in an emotional court hearing.

Before handing down the sentence, the judge said that probation would not be appropriate in this case.

Long voluntarily checked herself into rehab after the accident that killed 22-year-old college student Mary Warren, which happened on Interstate 25 in July. Colorado State Patrol officers said Long was driving the wrong way down the highway and that her blood alcohol was more than three times the legal limit.

The defense said Long has lived with an insidious disease for a very long time. Because of her alcoholism, she often had blackouts when she couldn't remember what happened.

Long addressed the court and said she made a very tragic mistake.

"It's excruciating how much pain there is in this room today. I wish with all my heart that there was something I could say that would take it all away, something I could do that would take it all away … but I know it's not possible," Long said.

Warren's sister and boyfriend also addressed the court Tuesday. They said Long could have prevented the accident from happening. That she chose to drink several glasses of wine that night and get in the car.

"May the measure of her life in the end be not by the good things that she tried to do, but by this horrible thing that she didn't care enough to prevent," said Valerie Hernandez, Warren's sister. "And then I received Mary's purse in an evidence bag at the coroner's office. Inside it was a card that lists six safe ways to get home for those who have consumed too much alcohol to drive. That is the worst thing about this tragedy is that it was preventable. I wish that with every breath that Elizabeth Long takes that she remembers the ones she took away."

In the past Long told the judge that she never wanted to drive again.