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Driver gets probation in fatal accident
YOUNGSTOWN
A man who pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide and operating a vehicle while impaired in an accident that killed a pedestrian on Glenwood Avenue last year has been sentenced to two years’ probation.
Ryan Ferrebee, 25, of Glenwood, drew the sentence Tuesday from Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
Judge Sweeney also fined him $1,000 and imposed a 180-day jail term, suspending all but the three days he must spend in jail or in a driver-intervention program.
The judge also suspended Ferrebee’s driver’s license for two years, retroactive to the day of the accident.
Ferrebee, who was initially charged with aggravated vehicular homicide, a second-degree felony, pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide, a first-degree misdemeanor, in a plea agreement with the prosecution.
He was charged in the April 5, 2015, accident, in which he was driving a car south in the curb lane and struck and killed Jorge Guartan, after Guartan stepped off the curb on Glenwood near Woodland Avenue on the South Side.
The prosecution recommended probation for Ferrebee, including 63 days in jail and three days in a driver-intervention program.
Ferrebee’s lawyer, Christopher A. Maruca, however, called for probation without incarceration, saying his client is a student and works in a Boardman restaurant.
“Any sentence of incarceration would disrupt and potentially ruin both areas of his life,” Maruca wrote in a sentencing memorandum.
Ferrebee is remorseful, has no prior criminal record, obeyed the speed limit and could not have stopped in time to avoid the accident, Maruca added.
“The pain that he’s gone through, and living with this for the rest of his life is punishment enough,” Maruca told the judge during the sentencing hearing.
“I would like to apologize sincerely for everything that occurred that night. It was a complete accident, and I’m sorry that I’m here standing before you and he [Guartan] is not,” Ferrebee told the judge.
Maruca and Nicholas Brevetta, assistant county prosecutor, said Guartan was extremely impaired by alcohol and drugs when the accident occurred.