A Galloway Township woman who continued on her way home before calling police about what turned out to be a fatal crash was sentenced to five years' probation.
Carmen Ruiz continued on, and then called police, saying she thought she hit something while driving west on Route 30, but it was too foggy to be sure.
More than an hour later, an Atlantic City officer found a shoe near mile marker 54. Miller’s body was then found in the marsh.
But Ruiz was arrested two years later, after the investigation revealed she used numerous medications that caused a state of intoxication and impaired her ability to operate a motor vehicle, the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office announced after her arrest in December of 2022.
She was released following a detention hearing, during which her attorney said the anti-psychotic medications were prescribed to Ruiz and were in the initial reports at the time of the crash 27 months earlier.
"It was a tragic accident," Salvatore Imperiale said at that time.
She pleaded guilty Oct. 17, to an amended to third-degree strict liability vehicular homicide, BreakingAC confirmed.
Ruiz, now 56, was sentenced Dec. 19, to five years of probation along with a loss of her license for the same time period.
