Ep. 251: Mother of woman killed by negligent driver slams Hennepin County: ‘Her life had no value in their mind’

A young mother killed by a negligent driver, but instead of closure,

Hennepin County's so-called justice system has made one family's nightmare even worse.

Next.

Mary Restrippo is my guest. Mary, thank you for being here.

My pleasure.

You know what happened to your daughter, Christina and your family is really beyond

tragic. Christina died just days after her 40th birthday back in 2023.

Her car was barely moving at the time when the driver of a box truck slammed into her at 60

miles an hour. Your daughter is survived by your grandson who I know was 12 at the time,

but tell us about your daughter and also tragically what happened that day.

Christina was one of the most vibrant people that I know.

She was well loved by family and friends and her son absolutely adored her.

They had so much fun. She was a huge supporter of his sporting events.

And I remember one of the moms saying to me after she was gone, the games are so much quieter

without Christina here. She just loved people, loved her brothers and and nieces and nephews and

just made everybody in her world feel special. And then tell us Mary about what happened in this

horrific crash. Just a couple days as you said after her 40th birthday, she had just dropped off

her son and was driving south on 169. Got a call from from the highway patrol.

And the officer asked where I was and proceeded then to tell me that my daughter had been killed

in a car accident. That Christina had been re-rended by a driver who was driving a box truck.

And it was captured on video both by the by a camera on the road.

And the interview was recorded by the officers on site wherein they told us very clearly that

he hit his brake lights only came on a fraction of a second prior to impact.

And so he hit her at nearly 60 miles an hour. She was driving a Nissan Altima and her car was

reduced to about half the size of what it was. She died a short time later at North Memorial

from numerous blunt force trauma injuries to her head, her neck, just her whole body. They

didn't want us to see her. And by that point she was already gone so we did not. But he admitted

on site, which is the most horrific part for me, that he had a YouTube video running and he

was trying to change the clock on his truck. So he did not see that traffic was slowed

way down in front of him. And he did not break. And both the right lane and the left lane were open.

He could have avoided the crash had he been paying attention. And so communication continued

with one of the officers from the state patrol. And he was very kind and very forthcoming,

always responded to my phone calls and questions. But early on in the process, he said to me,

you have to accept the fact that this man may never see punishment. Because this happened

in Henna McCowney and Henna Penn County does not hold people accountable to their crimes.

You know, that the only punishment he may ever have is living with the fact that he killed

somebody. Henna Penn County filed a complaint. And the complaint is, I mean, there are numerous

documents on the court system online that you can review. Or the complaint basically said

that he was charged with operating a vehicle in a grossly negligent matter.

And the level of that charge is a felony. And it carries a maximum sentence of 10 years

and or $20,000. But you have the justice system in Henna Penn County Mary Moriarty's office,

mind you, seems to have failed your daughter and your family in several ways. Even from the start,

it took nearly a year for criminal charges to be filed against the driver Fen Yang of Brooklyn

Park. Now it's been more than two years since the crash. And here you are, you're still waiting

for your day in court and justice for your daughter. What's happened in that time?

It started out where the county felt after they gathered all the information from the video

cameras, interviewed the parties on site, the other driver that was part of the accident,

they did all of their background work and felt that they had a case that was worth taking to trial.

And, you know, we were pleased with that approach because we felt that he needed to be,

he needed to have a day in court and and have his peers judge whether he was to be held accountable

or not. As the process continued, a new, a new defendant, a new defense attorney got involved.

And things started to get much more challenging. He did a lot of yelling at the prosecutor.

He did a lot of harassing type behaviors and really set the department on edge to the point where

the prosecutor several times said to me, all he does is yell at me. And it's like, you know,

if you get my comment to him, was if you're not able to handle the case, have someone else step in

who can represent this. And, you know, the hardest part for me was mentally and emotionally

getting prepared, again, to go to trial. And to know, they told us how gruesome the photos were.

They told us how gruesome the autopsy report was and that what people were going to say and

that, you know, we didn't need to be present during that part, but it was getting ready to face this man

knowing well what he did and how he has destroyed our family and most particularly with my grandson.

I'm the mom here. I will live with this put my heart breaks every time I look at my grandson because

because of all the things he will never be able to share with his mom. It's not right. It's not

fair. And it's all due to careless behavior. Sorry. And then making matters worse, Mary, is this

plea deal that kind of happens behind the scenes and something that your family from what I

understand was not on board with? We got to a point where when the assistant prosecutor had had

enough of the defense attorney, his supervisor, supervisor stepped in and stated that he had a

relationship with this man and that he would try and create a plea, get a plea process moving.

After some written communication with him, he decided to present a plea when we had a family

meeting scheduled for the following a couple days later. So he presented a plea without ever

involving the family. And all they could say through this process is we're open to listen to you

and hear your story and take your input. And we were into this 45 minute family conversation.

When I finally stopped and I looked at this man and I said, are you telling me that you already

submitted this plea without the family's input? He said, yeah. I mean, like no big deal. Yeah, I did.

The emotional impact that meeting had on all of us was once again, you say one thing and do another.

You said you were willing to listen to our input that we were taken into consideration with this

process and you forged forward. I mean, I was outspoken with the office because I felt they so

poorly handled the communication with us. And you know, they would do things, say things,

and then in weeks or months later, it would be totally contradictory.

This plea deal amounts to a little more than a slap on the wrist, a criminal vehicular homicide

supposed to carry up to 10 years in prison. But from this plea deal, Yang will likely only serve

a couple of months? They wanted the thing done. They really did. They wanted and when the supervisor

stepped in, he made that very clear and I confronted him and said, you know, this process was slow

and frustrating until you got involved and you made it at the serial and didn't didn't didn't

honor the statement that you were willing to listen to what the family said. So in another

meeting that happened after that, we got to a point where we said, my sons, my sons know the

impact that this has had on me. And you know, they got to a point where they said, mom, this just

needs to be done. We need to be able to move on. They're not going to there's never going to be

justice. Nothing will ever bring her back, but there will never be based on what has what has

happened thus far. He will never be held accountable. He will never do jail time that even makes sense

for the actions that he was involved in. So anyway, we got to the point where they also wanted five

years of probation and he had to be law abiding and then it would be expunge from his record.

Those were the terms that not at our agreement, but you know, we really didn't have a choice at

that point. If we wanted to book closed on this, that's the best it was going to be, which is a

fraction, as you said, a slap on the wrist, a fraction of what he deserved. But I got a message

from the special services coordinator over the weekend. She said, oh, I just found out that the

defense attorney wants to talk to you. It's like, why? No one had ever told me that that wasn't

even a possibility. And she said, well, I said to see just trying to make me mad. And she said,

most likely, he really wants to know what you're going to testify about when you do the spark

of life testimony where I give life to Christina. So I go to this meeting and I said, so what are

you going to ask me? What do you? And the flippant response was, I don't prepare questions until

right before trial. As we get closer to the trial itself, the defense attorney wanted me eliminated

as a witness because he didn't want anything I had to say to influence a jury about Christina

when it should have been about the case. And so then I get a second call from the county that says

the only thing you can talk about in the judge will be monitoring it closely is are the biological

facts about your daughter. But I could not give life to who she was, which is what the prosecution told

me this was all about. I said, I have a constitutional right to be able to say what I need to say.

And she said, well, you can't. The judge will be very firm about what you can and cannot say.

Well, we get a call that just as all of this was unfolding that the defendant had decided to submit

a plea. So I ended up being alone during this video plea. And he totally recanted everything

that was said and videotaped at the scene of the accident. He stated that he did not that his

phone was black. He did not have a video on. He was not trying to change his clock that he only

glanced down at his phone to see what time it was. So totally changed his story 100%. And you know,

then when they were finished and the plea was signed, then that he gave the judge gave the defense

the prosecuting attorney an answer to respond and said to him, do you have anything to add?

And he stood up at the table and he said, no, we're good. So it wasn't even important to him to go

back and correct the record, the court record. So now it's not in the record at all. I mean,

the judge was wise enough to ask the question because he read the complaint. He'd seen the report,

he'd seen the videos. He knew enough to ask the question and give the prosecutor an opportunity

to set the record straight and he wouldn't do it. And so, you know, here we are,

broken, tearful, saddened. And as I said earlier, I look at my grandson and it's like, you know,

I wanted, I asked at one point to have him sit down in front of Mary Moriarty and have her look

him in the face in the eyes and tell her, tell my grandson that his mother wasn't worth more than

a couple months in the workouts. It's horrific. Her life had no value in their mind and they'll tell

you otherwise, but the result of the situation clearly states that they just wanted the case off the

table and didn't really care whether this man was expected to be accountable for the crime or not.

Your grandson is 15 now. Mary, we have a recent photo of him visiting his mother's head stone.

I know you also wanted to call attention to the prosecution in the fact that this is important

for all Minnesotans to know about this case. What is your message to them?

There has just not been the ability to start any closure with this at all. So the timeline is

critically important that someone steps in, makes improvements to this system. And the sentencing

is equally as serious that, you know, how is it that you can have a charge that shows 10 years

incarceration and $20,000 in fines. And we don't even have a fraction of that that's being imposed.

The other part that shows this man's irresponsibility is an insurance issue with the state. And so

I have brought attention to the state at the legislative level and they really need to deal with

both the insurance and the penalties for distracted driving. Nothing will change with distracted

drivers until there's something where people know that they will be held accountable.

I do want to mention there is a fun setup to help your grandson, Mary for Stryppo. Thank you so

much for sharing this difficult story and for continuing to fight for your daughter. Thanks for

joining us. Thank you so much for listening. Now we'll do it for this episode of Liz Collin Reports.

We'll see you next time.