"2 drunk 2 care" driver wants prison sentence reduced
MIAMI -- Kayla Mendoza -- who killed two young women in a wrong-way crash while driving intoxicated on a South Florida expressway after having infamously tweeted "2 drunk 2 care" just hours before -- wants to have her prison sentence reduced from 24 years to 10 years, reports CBS Miami.
Mendoza made the request in an apologetic letter to the judge who had sentenced her less than three months ago in the October 2013 collision, according to the station.
"I'd like to get out and be involved in Mothers Against Drunk Driving with the victims' families," Mendoza reportedly wrote. "I can't bring back the lives I took, but I can if I'm allowed, help save lives."
She added, "I don't ever want another family to be broken like the families that have been broken because of me. I've learned that choices are not accidents. I am owning up to my poor choices and asking for a chance to show you that I can and am ready to make the right choices."
In the letter, Mendoza says she plans to take substance abuse classes and is open to any amount of probation or community control that the judge sees fit, according to the station. She also said that she wants to work and earn money to pay restitution, court costs, and the money she owes the victims in their civil lawsuit.
"Please, Your Honor," she reportedly wrote. "Give me a chance to try and fix things."
According to CBS Miami, Christine Ferrante, the mother of Kaitlyn, 21, who was killed in the crash, learned of the letter on Wednesday and said she was appalled.
"She can't fix things," Ferrante told the station. "How can she bring back Marisa and Katie? That's fixing things and she can't do that."
Ferrante said the victims families are dealing with a lifetime sentence of heartbreak and that Mendoza should serve her punishment.
"Our daughters don't have the option of saying, 'I don't want to be here. I don't want to be in an urn. I don't want to be in a casket." She has the nerve to say that she's learned her lesson?"
Gary Catronio, the father of Marisa, 21, who was also killed, is stunned at Mendoza's request just months after she landed in prison.
"If the system even considers something like this, I have no respect for the system that we have called justice," he said.
Catronio said under her sentence, Mendoza should be out of prison around her early 40's, reports the station.
"To get out of prison and be a young person at 40, that's plenty of life left," he said. "I'd take that in a heartbeat for our daughters."
Judge Haimes asked prosecutors to respond to Mendoza's request within 90 days. The Catronio's and Ferrante's plan to make their feelings known.
According to the station, Mendoza's lawyer, John Trevena, said that he was not aware of the letter and that Mendoza sent it on her own.