Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / BRIDE IN WEDDING DRESS MOWED DOWN DEAD: DRUNK DRIVER SNIVELS 'GUILTY' IN COURT

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BRIDE IN WEDDING DRESS MOWED DOWN DEAD: DRUNK DRIVER SNIVELS 'GUILTY' IN COURT · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

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  Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A bride in her wedding
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  Speaker 1: dress mowed down dead, the driver sniveling guilty in court.
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  Speaker 1: I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: being with us.
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  Speaker 2: North Carolina bride Samantha Miller and groom Eric Hutchinson have
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  Speaker 2: just said their vows and tied the knot on Fowley Beach,
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  Speaker 2: South Carolina, setting off to celebrate the night. They're writing
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  Speaker 2: down a beach road in a golf cart when they
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  Speaker 2: encounter a deadly surprise.
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  Speaker 3: On the golfer, showing me you didn't want to night
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  Speaker 3: to ends there on the floor, Kevin.
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  Speaker 4: The next thing I remember is waking up in the hospital.
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  Speaker 1: That is the groom of a beautiful bride mowed down
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  Speaker 1: by a drunk driver who just showed up in court
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  Speaker 1: sniveling guilty. That's aroun our friends at ABC four joining
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  Speaker 1: me in All Star panel to make sense of what
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  Speaker 1: we know right now in the last hours, the sniveling,
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: snotting dui driver Jamie Lee Komrowski shows up in court
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  Speaker 1: and she paints one picture for us all to believe
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  Speaker 1: she's reading off of a document about how sorry she is,
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  Speaker 1: and she loses her place. The lawyer has to point
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  Speaker 1: to her where to keep reading. That's what she wants
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  Speaker 1: me to see. But I want you to see who
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  Speaker 1: she really is.
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  Speaker 5: Listen, I'm glad, Okay, Well, varied minds have different opinions.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, you are a bad person, but I'm not the
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  Speaker 1: church lady. This is not about whether you're a good
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  Speaker 1: or bad. This is not whether you're you know, houring
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  Speaker 1: out on the corner or you're in the choir loft
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  Speaker 1: singing on Sunday morning. This is about the death of
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  Speaker 1: a beautiful young woman, a woman who died after she
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  Speaker 1: was slammed into on her wedding night in her bride's dress,
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  Speaker 1: her body thrown over one hundred yards from her golf cart.
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  Speaker 1: Because you, Comarowski, were drunk, so drunk that when you
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  Speaker 1: stood up when cops got there, you fell down. You
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  Speaker 1: stunk of alcohol. But that's me talking. Let's hear more
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  Speaker 1: from the horse's.
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  Speaker 6: Mouth, right, I don't know what's happened to me, because
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  Speaker 6: fan fans happened to good people hating.
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  Speaker 7: That's why it's just it's just feet. It's just something
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  Speaker 7: happened to you. And we are going to deal with
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  Speaker 7: the reventually.
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  Speaker 1: Today, Why do bad things happen to me? What happened
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  Speaker 1: is that a bride was murdered on her wedding night.
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  Speaker 1: The groom is irreparably physically, mentally and emotionally damaged. He
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  Speaker 1: had bleeding to the brain. The golf cart they were
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  Speaker 1: driving was found seventy five yards away from the crash.
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  Speaker 1: The golf cart flew seventy five yards away from the crash.
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  Speaker 1: Can I just look at this very quickly? I want
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  Speaker 1: to go to Kimberly Cockrell joining US victim services manager
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  Speaker 1: at Mothers Against Drunk Driving? Did you just hear the
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  Speaker 1: drunk driver over two times the legal limits? She's point
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  Speaker 1: TiO six. Now, wait a minute, I was told over
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  Speaker 1: two times. That's over three times. Isn't the legal limit
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  Speaker 1: point zero eight in that jurisdiction? She's over three times
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  Speaker 1: the legal limit? But I'm hearing her say, why is
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  Speaker 1: this happening to me?
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  Speaker 8: She was taking absolutely no responsibility at that point. It
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  Speaker 8: was the enabling that her family has done got us
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  Speaker 8: to this point. What she was in that point was
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  Speaker 8: thinking about herself, not what she did that night.
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  Speaker 1: Joining us now is Mark Pepper out of Charleston, South Carolina.
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  Speaker 1: This jurisdiction veteran and high profile criminal defense attorney with
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  Speaker 1: the Pepper Law Firm. Mark, thank you for being with us.
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  Speaker 1: What do you do with a client? She actually said,
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  Speaker 1: you know, well, let's just here one more time, Control room,
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  Speaker 1: if you could play sixty eight again, because I want
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  Speaker 1: Mark Pepper to hear this.
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  Speaker 6: I don't happen to me, because happened to good people.
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  Speaker 7: To our it's just great. It's just something that happened
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  Speaker 7: to you, and we are going to deal with the.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, bad things happen to good people. You may like
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  Speaker 1: the victim Samantha and her husband Eric. Then what do
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  Speaker 1: you do with the client that is so self obsessed?
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  Speaker 1: She's whining about herself, the woman the bride is dead,
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  Speaker 1: the husband's got so many screws in his mouth he
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  Speaker 1: probably sets off alarms, and she's saying, me, me, me, me, me,
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  Speaker 1: What do you do with that? I wouldn't even let
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  Speaker 1: her stand up and talk.
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  Speaker 9: Yeah, Nancy, thanks for having me.
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  Speaker 10: One of the toughest parts of our job as criminal
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  Speaker 10: defense lawyers is not only dealing with the facts of
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  Speaker 10: the case, but dealing with our client and their family members.
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  Speaker 10: As we just heard, it was very, very clear early
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  Speaker 10: on and likely throughout this prosecution, that the family members
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  Speaker 10: were simply enabling her. And the reality never sets in
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  Speaker 10: until I physically go to the client and make them
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  Speaker 10: understand that. You can believe whatever you want to believe,
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  Speaker 10: that good things having to bad people and bad things
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  Speaker 10: having to good people. That's all good and well, but
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  Speaker 10: at the end of day, you need to understand the reality.
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  Speaker 1: Ms.
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  Speaker 9: Kamarowski.
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  Speaker 10: The reality is you're in a bad spot because of
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  Speaker 10: bad decisions that you made, and you're facing twenty five
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  Speaker 10: years in prison. Let's start focusing on how we can
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  Speaker 10: mitigate that. Quit talking to your family members, quit talking
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  Speaker 10: to anybody that's going to enable you, and tell you
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  Speaker 10: what such a good person you have that's wrong. Okay,
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  Speaker 10: We've got work to do. That is ninety percent of
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  Speaker 10: our job as criminal offense attorneys.
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  Speaker 1: And we look at your screen. Do you see this
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  Speaker 1: woman there's more bread than sack. Let me just say
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  Speaker 1: that about her shirt. Okay, but again, not the church lady.
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  Speaker 1: I don't care. You're seeing shots just then of Kamarowski.
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  Speaker 1: Now that is the woman who put on the crying
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  Speaker 1: jag in front of the judge. And I'm not through
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  Speaker 1: with the judge. Yet either everybody keeps saying she got
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  Speaker 1: the max. She did not get the max. This judge
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  Speaker 1: ran all the sentences concurrently at the same time. They
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  Speaker 1: should have been run consecutively, one after the next. But
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  Speaker 1: that said, this reminds me of someone else after the
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  Speaker 1: murder of a family member. All they can say is me,
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  Speaker 1: me me, me, me, me, me, me me me. Listen,
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  Speaker 1: I think you know her.
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  Speaker 6: Just to understand, we're all going in so many different directions.
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  Speaker 6: We just want to go in the right one.
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  Speaker 11: Well, I can't point you in that direction when I'm
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  Speaker 11: literally at a standstill. I am just as removed from
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  Speaker 11: the situation as somebody who has no clue what's going on.
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  Speaker 11: At least even random people that we've never met have
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  Speaker 11: more of an outlook on this than I do. Right now,
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  Speaker 11: it's really sad. That's really really sad that I literally
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  Speaker 11: have nothing right now.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, you are seeing top mom Casey Anthony on a
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  Speaker 1: jail phone call. Her parents constantly have to calm her
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  Speaker 1: down because she's obsessed about me, me, me, me me.
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  Speaker 1: There she's saying, I literally have nothing now. Your daughter
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  Speaker 1: is dead and a trash bag and a swamp woman
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  Speaker 1: and you're whining behind bars about your situation. Really, I
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  Speaker 1: need to shrink and I need one right now. Let
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  Speaker 1: me go out to doctor Jory crass and joining US
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  Speaker 1: Forensic Psychologists faculty, Saint Leo University, author of Operation s OS.
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  Speaker 1: There's got to be something stronger in your DSM manual
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  Speaker 1: than narcissistic. There's gotten to be something stronger. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: you see top mom. Two year old Killy is dead, murdered. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: you see Kamarowski. The bride is dead. She flew the
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  Speaker 1: the air one hundred yards thanks to Karowski, and she's saying,
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  Speaker 1: why did this happen to me?
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  Speaker 9: What is that?
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  Speaker 12: You know, Narcosism doesn't just start overnight. You don't become
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  Speaker 12: this type of person. We've heard the term enabled and
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  Speaker 12: if you look at it, her life has been full
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  Speaker 12: of this enablement and that keeps her from making choices
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  Speaker 12: and decisions, and the ones she makes are bad and
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  Speaker 12: like this where she's now regretting. I guess would be
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  Speaker 12: the term. But she still hasn't connect that decision with
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  Speaker 12: the outcome of it and the results of it. It
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  Speaker 12: may take the twenty five year sentence to really reach
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  Speaker 12: her in that depth of.
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  Speaker 1: Elevel crime stories with Nancy Grace joining me now in
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  Speaker 1: this to high profile lawyer Mark Pepper, Dave Mack, Kimberly Cockrell,
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  Speaker 1: and doctor Jory crawlsen Is Tom Smith. You know him well,
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  Speaker 1: Former NYPD detective co host gold Shields podcast, Tom Smith.
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  Speaker 1: I've had about a snoopful with Jamie Komarowski. Forget about
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  Speaker 1: the top. That's more bread than sack. Okay, I don't care.
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  Speaker 1: But what I do care about is sir lying in court.
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  Speaker 1: She actually lied, Tom, She said, I've never been in
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  Speaker 1: trouble before. Well that's bs because she's had three priors.
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  Speaker 1: They're listed as speedings. But Evan, it suggests there do
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  Speaker 1: UIs and it's been sealed. This woman is a walking
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  Speaker 1: crime let or. And she goes in front of the judge.
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  Speaker 1: Was all of that and lied?
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  Speaker 13: Yep?
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  Speaker 9: And just look at all the pictures.
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  Speaker 4: Every picture you just showed has something in her hand
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  Speaker 4: at an event or something like that.
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  Speaker 1: Well, you're right, you're right, Tom Smith. How could I
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  Speaker 1: ignore evidence? And every photo she's around some booze. There
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  Speaker 1: she is with a solo cup. I guarantee you that
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  Speaker 1: ain't hot tea. You're right, Tom, Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: And you know that goes to the premeditation of making
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  Speaker 4: a bad decision. She's made them before. This is just
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  Speaker 4: the first time something bad happened, so she always thought
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  Speaker 4: she could get away with it. And that's why it's
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  Speaker 4: so important, Nancy, and you know this. That's why it's
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  Speaker 4: so important for investigators and police and detectives to show
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  Speaker 4: up to the scene and do every single thing correctly,
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  Speaker 4: so there's no technicalities of her getting away with anything.
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  Speaker 1: Is it not bothering you? Mark? There she is in
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  Speaker 1: kind of a I don't know, an ad or promo
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  Speaker 1: for bud Beer. Is it not bothering you? Mark Pepper
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  Speaker 1: that an every shot is alcohol related or she's drinking
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  Speaker 1: and smiling. I mean the entitlement.
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  Speaker 10: What bothers me the most is that as a criminal
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  Speaker 10: defense lawyer, when you see these pictures plastered all over Facebook,
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  Speaker 10: trial is no longer an option. Even if you think
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  Speaker 10: you have the ability to convince a jury of reasonable
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  Speaker 10: doubt regarding the facts, Once these pictures come in and
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  Speaker 10: it paints the picture of who this defendant was, your
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  Speaker 10: options are pretty limited. She clearly and look, we all
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  Speaker 10: went to college, most of us. We all had a
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  Speaker 10: good time and maybe into our young twenties. But if
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  Speaker 10: every single picture that's going to be shown to the
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  Speaker 10: jury involves a solo cup, if not an actual alcoholic beverage,
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  Speaker 10: and you're dressed the way you are, it paints a
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  Speaker 10: picture to the jury without you even having the ability
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  Speaker 10: to rehabilitate yourself on the stand. So that's what bothers
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  Speaker 10: me the most of all of this is that it
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  Speaker 10: takes one huge option for the defense team and puts
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  Speaker 10: it completely out the window, leaving her no choice but
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  Speaker 10: to plead guilty. Anytime you go into a case where
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  Speaker 10: you only have one choice, it's not the best case.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, for this woman, I bring in in another strength.
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  Speaker 1: Forensic psychologist doctor Sherry Schwartz listen.
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  Speaker 14: Hearing about that particular post with Bud light Year. What
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  Speaker 14: this tells me is this is someone who has incorporated
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  Speaker 14: as part of her identity the humor in having this
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  Speaker 14: relationship with alcohol, a clearly unhealthy relationship, and as someone
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  Speaker 14: who has previously been in legal trouble with a DUI,
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  Speaker 14: she's savvy enough to say, I'm not going to blow
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  Speaker 14: into a breathalyzer, which tells me that she had consciousness
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  Speaker 14: of mind to know that she shouldn't be driving.
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  Speaker 1: And in the last hours, the runt driver, Jamie Lee Komarowski,
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  Speaker 1: who killed a bride on her wedding night, makes an
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  Speaker 1: outrageous demand. Believe it or not, Just after the sentence,
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  Speaker 1: Kamarowski insists that the judge reduce her sentence. That's right.
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  Speaker 1: Jamie Lee Kamarowski, ordered to spend twenty five years behind bars,
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  Speaker 1: now insists that the sentence was too stringent.
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  Speaker 15: They did the Sparkler exit where everybody lines up in
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  Speaker 15: like Sparkler's and they go underneath. She's the happiest I've
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  Speaker 15: ever seen her in her life. They got on the
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  Speaker 15: golf cart.
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  Speaker 6: They left.
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  Speaker 15: Ten minutes later. We went to our airbnb, which was
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  Speaker 15: before theirs, so they were still traveling. I started hearing
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  Speaker 15: sirens and literally I looked at my daughter and I said,
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  Speaker 15: something happened to Sam. I knew something that happened to Sam.
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  Speaker 1: You are hearing Sam's mom, Lisa Miller, telling me about
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: the night of the crash. She's about to join us live,
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  Speaker 1: but I wanted to hear what else she told me.
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  Speaker 15: I called Sam and apologized calling her on her wedding night,
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  Speaker 15: but she called me back and let me know she
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  Speaker 15: was okay, and then the family memory get the truck,
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  Speaker 15: and so me and my daughter got in the truck
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  Speaker 15: and she took us to the scene, which was maybe
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  Speaker 15: a mile away, not even two blocks from where they
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  Speaker 15: were going to stay. Me and my daughter got out
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  Speaker 15: of the truck and just started running hand in hand
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  Speaker 15: towards the scene and just screaming, Tam, Tam, tam. I
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  Speaker 15: heard that was there and my son waiting at the
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  Speaker 15: scene and trying to figure out what was going on.
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  Speaker 15: And we were told by somebody I don't know who
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  Speaker 15: that everybody had been taken to the hospital, and so
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  Speaker 15: my daughter and I went to the hospital.
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  Speaker 1: Joining us now is a very special guest who I
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  Speaker 1: consider a friend. This is Samantha's mother, Lisa Miller. Miss Miller,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: thank you for being with us.
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  Speaker 16: Sure, thank you for having me.
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  Speaker 1: Miss Miller. I've thought about you so many times since
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  Speaker 1: we last spoke, and you have been through hell. Is
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  Speaker 1: it any better after sentence?
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  Speaker 16: If it's supposed to be, it's not yet. I mean,
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  Speaker 16: I'm glad that she got the max time, for sure,
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  Speaker 16: because we have the rest of our lives to deal
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  Speaker 16: with this tragedy. We were sitting to life so twenty
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  Speaker 16: five years. She still got off pretty easy. People say
• 16:24
  Speaker 16: that justice for Samantha, and yes, the girl got the
• 16:29
  Speaker 16: most time, but that doesn't take.
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  Speaker 9: Away the pain.
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  Speaker 16: It doesn't take away the heart aching for your daughter,
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  Speaker 16: the part of you as a mom that dies, that's
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  Speaker 16: all still there.
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  Speaker 1: You know, miss Miller. With every little injury, every little cut,
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  Speaker 1: every little heartache that your child goes through. Sometimes I think, Lisa,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: that the mother feels at ten times over. I still
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: relive hurts or disappointments that my twins had when they
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: were itty bitty. I remember them and how I've said
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: I would before them. Long after they've moved on, you know,
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  Speaker 1: I remember that, And I've just just been thinking about
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  Speaker 1: you so much. And what was it like in that courtroom?
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  Speaker 6: I couldn't wait to leave.
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  Speaker 9: Tensions were high.
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  Speaker 16: I think it's just a very heavy, dark atmosphere, and
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  Speaker 16: everybody feels it. Everybody that's there feels it.
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: When you saw Jamie Lee Kumarowski in the courtroom, what
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: went through your mind?
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  Speaker 16: I understand that I'm supposed to and what happens to
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  Speaker 16: a lot of people whose children or friends or parents
• 18:01
  Speaker 16: or get killed by drunk drivers that I'm supposed to
• 18:05
  Speaker 16: hate her for whatever reason. I think we had so
• 18:09
  Speaker 16: much other things thrown at us. I do not think
• 18:14
  Speaker 16: about this girl. I didn't want to do bad things
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  Speaker 16: to this girl, you know. And maybe it's because what
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  Speaker 16: I've done for a living for the past twenty years.
• 18:24
  Speaker 16: I'm a drug and alcohol counselor. And she made some
• 18:27
  Speaker 16: really bad choices. She didn't wake up that morning and
• 18:30
  Speaker 16: say I'm going to kill Sam. It wasn't a personal thing.
• 18:36
  Speaker 16: Did her choices result in the death of my daughter
• 18:39
  Speaker 16: that's killing me every single day? Yes, obviously I'm not
• 18:44
  Speaker 16: her biggest fan, and thank god that she's going to
• 18:48
  Speaker 16: spend a very large portion of her life having a
• 18:52
  Speaker 16: lot of time to think about what she did in
• 18:54
  Speaker 16: her poor decisions and the fact that to get any treatment.
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  Speaker 1: When you said you don't hate her, I know exactly
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: how you feel. The day I saw the man that
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: murdered my fiance in court, I was numb and to
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: this day I still don't hate him. I don't care
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: anything about him. It's right. Yeah, more pain and the
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: hurt is what I felt and feel over that. Mark
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: Pepper joining us high profile lawyer out of this jurisdiction.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: Part of the rules of the road are that you
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: don't have a right to drive, it's a privilege. So
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: when you are pulled over, you are supposed to, if asked,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: if directed, submit to a breathalyzer, and if you don't,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: that in itself is a violation of the law.
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  Speaker 10: It is, and it suspends your driving privileges for six months.
• 19:55
  Speaker 10: We don't have actual breathalyzers on the scene. What she
• 19:59
  Speaker 10: was asked to do was to perform field sobriety tests,
• 20:02
  Speaker 10: which you are allowed to decline here. Then if proble
• 20:06
  Speaker 10: will cause exists, as it did here, you're taken to
• 20:09
  Speaker 10: a hospital to be checked out, you're taken to a jail,
• 20:11
  Speaker 10: and at that point you're administered the BA test. She's
• 20:15
  Speaker 10: within her right to decline it. It does come with consequences, though, Nancy,
• 20:19
  Speaker 10: as you pointed out, in our state, when you sign
• 20:21
  Speaker 10: up to be a licensed driver in South Carolina, you
• 20:24
  Speaker 10: acquiesce to give a blood excuse me, a breathalyzer analysis
• 20:29
  Speaker 10: test at any point in time. If you decline it,
• 20:32
  Speaker 10: such as she did here, you automatically lose your license
• 20:35
  Speaker 10: for it six months.
• 20:36
  Speaker 9: It's a choice she made so.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: She to refuse to take the BAC. The breath analyzer.
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: She knew enough to know she was drunk when she
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: stood up and correct me if I'm wrong, Dave Mac.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: When she got out of the car for police, she
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: immediately fell down drunk. They could smell herb You know,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: I've Dave with so many duys and HIV habitual violators
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: that actually come to court drunk. And it's not their breaths,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: their skin, they actually smell like alcohol. Their body stinks.
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: And she was so out of it she thought she
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: had been hit. But what you've got to hear who
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: she blames Listen, And.
• 21:24
  Speaker 6: It was a golf car.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: I know, honey, we know, honey.
• 21:31
  Speaker 6: The freaking road and this couldn't happen to anyone, Like.
• 21:35
  Speaker 13: Why Like why.
• 21:39
  Speaker 6: Why me? I don't understand, like this could have happened
• 21:45
  Speaker 6: so many other people.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, she lied to police, she
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: lied in court, and in my mind, still got a
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: lenient sentence. She could have been looking at twenty five
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: plus fifteen thirty five forty plus ten fifty years behind bars.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: She got twenty five, which I think is like you know,
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: going to kmart and getting a two for one special.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: That said, she's blaming the victim. For being in a
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: golf cart Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I'm gonna go
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: straight back out to Lisa Miller, Samantha's mother, that night
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: from leaving Sam's beautiful wedding. I remember what you told
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: me that you heard sirens and you knew, you knew,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: and you said something's happened to Sam.
• 22:55
  Speaker 16: Yep, I knew it, And I mean I know this.
• 23:00
  Speaker 9: I'ds weird, but even back.
• 23:03
  Speaker 6: Thirty five years ago.
• 23:04
  Speaker 16: I guess when you know I became pregnant with her.
• 23:10
  Speaker 16: I was at the beach, you know, I was young
• 23:13
  Speaker 16: on the way home from the beach that I said
• 23:16
  Speaker 16: to my girlfriend, watched me be pregnant. I'm like Sam
• 23:19
  Speaker 16: and I have always been. It's weird, just really, really
• 23:23
  Speaker 16: really the connection. And I think a mom in general
• 23:28
  Speaker 16: is so connected to her kids. I think that I've
• 23:32
  Speaker 16: done some research and scientifically, when the child comes out
• 23:37
  Speaker 16: of you, there areselves that are left inside of you.
• 23:39
  Speaker 9: I can tell you I hurt.
• 23:42
  Speaker 16: But I'm missing too. It's more like I'm not me anymore.
• 23:47
  Speaker 16: A giganic part of me is it's gone with Sam,
• 23:51
  Speaker 16: and I feel like I'm half a person. I go
• 23:55
  Speaker 16: back and look at pictures even pictures of me, and
• 23:59
  Speaker 16: I'm like, where's that person, where's that smile, where's that positivity?
• 24:05
  Speaker 16: Which I still try, you know, I'm getting some back.
• 24:09
  Speaker 16: But I think that's just like mislow amputated my leg.
• 24:14
  Speaker 13: You know.
• 24:15
  Speaker 16: I think that's what it's like, is that you have
• 24:16
  Speaker 16: to learn to live your life moving forward without these parts.
• 24:22
  Speaker 16: And that's about the closest thing I could kind of
• 24:26
  Speaker 16: relate it to. It's just literally losing some parts of
• 24:32
  Speaker 16: your body. And what people do when they, you know,
• 24:35
  Speaker 16: they get something amputated, you know, they're never going to
• 24:38
  Speaker 16: be the same. They have to learn how to live
• 24:40
  Speaker 16: without those parts. And so that's what we're working on.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: That's really interesting what you're saying, miss Miller. I've had
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: people say you had a total personality change after Keith
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: was murdered. I don't even remember that girl, that girl
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: they say I used to be. I don't even remember
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: what that was. But they all separated in time and space,
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: say you're not even the same person you used to be,
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: And I can explain. I cannot explain that. I've compared
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: it to people talk about closure. That's total bs. There's
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: no such thing. There's no such thing I've talked about,
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: how maybe it's like you break your arm and you
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: never get it set, but you go on to learn
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: to flip a pancake. It's never the same, but you
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: managed to, as you say, with an amputato leg, you
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: manage to find a way to walk. But it's never
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: the same.
• 25:35
  Speaker 16: You're not the same.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: And in the last hours, Kamaraski's lawyers in court showing
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: quote unequivocal acceptance of responsibility for her actions and therefore,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: because of her quote genuine expressions of remorse, her sentence
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: should be slashed.
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: So today tomorrow fire my love a Serfore.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: You can learn from our friends at ABC seven. That
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: is the groom who suffered bleeding to the brain and massive,
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: massive internal trauma MANI broken bones, Eric Cutchinson stating I
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: will love you today, tomorrow and every day until I
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: take my last breath on this earth. I was supposed
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: to have her before you killed her. And throughout this
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: the dy booze after a booze field day of bar hopping,
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: lies to police that she had one beer of one tequila,
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: falls down, drunk, stinks to high heaven. Here is the
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: dui driver, whining and complaining because her grandparents are taking
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: care of her cat.
• 26:54
  Speaker 14: Okay, well, okay, here's her thing, here's.
• 27:00
  Speaker 13: My cat.
• 27:01
  Speaker 15: Hang on, you need a reality check real quick right now, girl,
• 27:04
  Speaker 15: that's not your cat right now, because you left that
• 27:07
  Speaker 15: guy in an unfortunate situation and they're taking care of
• 27:10
  Speaker 15: the cat.
• 27:10
  Speaker 13: Now.
• 27:11
  Speaker 12: So that's trillion, that's my cat.
• 27:14
  Speaker 6: I'm not going to be any here forever.
• 27:15
  Speaker 15: I'm kidding.
• 27:16
  Speaker 6: I'm going to be like a couple of months and
• 27:18
  Speaker 6: then I'm going to be back cold.
• 27:19
  Speaker 13: Wow.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: Martin Pepper, high profile lawyer in this jurisdiction. On another
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: jail call, she states, I will be living my quote
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: best life in less than two years out of here. Whipsie.
• 27:33
  Speaker 13: Yeah.
• 27:33
  Speaker 10: No, She's going to be living a really, really well
• 27:36
  Speaker 10: deserved rough life in the South Kinna Department of Corrections
• 27:40
  Speaker 10: for at least the next twenty to twenty one years,
• 27:43
  Speaker 10: with credit for time serve given yesterday, which is exactly
• 27:46
  Speaker 10: where she should be.
• 27:47
  Speaker 15: Uh.
• 27:48
  Speaker 9: Don't forget, Nancy that this judge could have given her
• 27:51
  Speaker 9: a minimum of one year.
• 27:53
  Speaker 10: That's what our statute allows, one to twenty five years,
• 27:56
  Speaker 10: twenty five years along with the fifteen and ten runking.
• 28:01
  Speaker 10: I know that you'll disagree, which I respect. But when
• 28:04
  Speaker 10: we talk about the sentencing rules of the road, rehabilitation,
• 28:09
  Speaker 10: deterrence removal, I think Judge Jefferson chose five years.
• 28:14
  Speaker 9: That's what the all allows for.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: She's already had three. We think DUIs to rehabilitate. She
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: is no more rehabilitated than.
• 28:25
  Speaker 13: The man in the moon? Are you?
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: I can't believe you actually said that rehabilitate.
• 28:30
  Speaker 9: Get rehabilitated in two years.
• 28:35
  Speaker 10: Well, allegedly first to you, I believe that that it
• 28:39
  Speaker 10: was dismissed, uh and a reckless driving tickets gone.
• 28:42
  Speaker 9: But twenty five years, you're removing the.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: Individual from I was dismissed.
• 28:47
  Speaker 10: Well, the initial one that's been alleged to occurred, I
• 28:51
  Speaker 10: believe was a reckless driving.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: Nonetheless, Nancy d was dismissed such to bring that time,
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: and then after that there were two mores and two
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: more and now Samantha is dead. You know the degree
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: of entitlement of this woman to Sam's mom, Lisa, what
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: about it?
• 29:13
  Speaker 15: I think that what we have here is a young
• 29:16
  Speaker 15: lady that has been bailed out because her family has money,
• 29:20
  Speaker 15: and has not been held accountable for any of her
• 29:24
  Speaker 15: poor choices. And when you continue to bail somebody out,
• 29:27
  Speaker 15: they're never going to learn. And she has not suffered
• 29:30
  Speaker 15: any consequences, so she continues the same behavior. And unfortunately
• 29:34
  Speaker 15: it happens a lot and a lot of my patients.
• 29:36
  Speaker 15: They've been enabled and their parents take care of everything
• 29:39
  Speaker 15: and fix it and trying to protect them, but they're
• 29:42
  Speaker 15: not really protecting them because now my daughter's dead.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: Now to Kimberly Cockrail joining us from Columbia, South Carolina.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Victim services manager at mad Mothers against driving. Kimberly. So
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: often I see people, including the dui driver themselves, act
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: like it was all just it's a misunderstanding. You know,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: I had a couple of drinks. This really happened to me.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: I didn't do anything wrong. And that's what we're seeing here.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: And Lisa Sam's mother is saying that she has been
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: bailed out. We just heard Mark Pepper say that the
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: original dui charges we think were dismissed. There have been
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: three priors, three prior incidents, and now this. I don't
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: like it when dui crashes or referred to as accidents,
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: it's not an accident. Kimberly, can you explain why the.
• 30:36
  Speaker 8: Word accident is something that grates on my nerves so
• 30:40
  Speaker 8: much when it comes to DUI crashes. I lost my
• 30:44
  Speaker 8: best friend twenty three years ago, almost And if I
• 30:47
  Speaker 8: hear the word accident one more time when it refers
• 30:50
  Speaker 8: to one of these, that was not an accident. An
• 30:53
  Speaker 8: accident as a child runs out into a street after
• 30:56
  Speaker 8: a ball and you're not drunk, you're not on your
• 30:59
  Speaker 8: phone phone, you're not looking down messing with the radio. Accident,
• 31:04
  Speaker 8: You hit this child and you do everything you can
• 31:06
  Speaker 8: to stop. That is an accident. What this woman did
• 31:10
  Speaker 8: that night was no accident. She was egregiously drunk. She
• 31:15
  Speaker 8: made a choice. That choice took Samantha Miller's life. Samantha
• 31:20
  Speaker 8: Miller had so many things to look forward to in
• 31:24
  Speaker 8: her life, and mind you, one of them was getting
• 31:26
  Speaker 8: back home to her cat, who will never see her again.
• 31:29
  Speaker 8: Listening to you her, listening to her talk about her
• 31:32
  Speaker 8: cat and how she's annoyed that her grandparents are taking
• 31:35
  Speaker 8: care of that.
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: Do you know that Lisa Miller would.
• 31:38
  Speaker 8: Give anything, anything for her daughter to actually hold her
• 31:43
  Speaker 8: cat again. These are not accidents, Nancy. These are crashes.
• 31:47
  Speaker 8: These are collisions, and they are choices made by these drivers.
• 31:52
  Speaker 6: And it was a golf car.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: I know, honey, we know, honey.
• 32:00
  Speaker 6: On the freaking road. This is just gonna happen to anyone,
• 32:03
  Speaker 6: Like why me, why why? I don't understand like this
• 32:12
  Speaker 6: could have have to be so many other people.
• 32:15
  Speaker 13: Form there to go to alcohol rehab. Okay, right, okay,
• 32:25
  Speaker 13: that's part of it. Part right? How long is that?
• 32:31
  Speaker 13: Four to six weeks?
• 32:34
  Speaker 6: All right, well listen, if it helps the case, then
• 32:39
  Speaker 6: I'll do it.
• 32:42
  Speaker 17: Might help you a little too, sure, Well, yeah, you know,
• 32:48
  Speaker 17: so more information is coming out about what happened, So.
• 32:57
  Speaker 7: Your vac level.
• 33:01
  Speaker 13: Alcohol level?
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: Did I just see her roll her eyes? Feel so
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: bad for the father, Mark Pepper. The dad is sitting
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: there in his T shirt going, hey, honey, you know
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: you're going to have to go to alcohol rep rehab.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: She's like, how long is that?
• 33:23
  Speaker 7: He goes?
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: Four to six weeks? And she goes, did you see that?
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: Should I believe you are my lion eyes because I
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: just saw that?
• 33:32
  Speaker 15: Yeah?
• 33:32
  Speaker 10: No, I saw it, And Nancy is you're probably aware
• 33:34
  Speaker 10: of My firm successfully sued the Sheriff's office to get
• 33:37
  Speaker 10: those jail tapes released on to have a local media outlet,
• 33:40
  Speaker 10: and it was sick to my stomach when I was
• 33:42
  Speaker 10: listening to all fifteen hours of those jail tips tapes.
• 33:47
  Speaker 10: Maybe sick both personally and professionally. On one hand, you
• 33:51
  Speaker 10: clearly can see this father trying to get her to
• 33:54
  Speaker 10: understand the reality the gravity of the situation that she's in,
• 33:57
  Speaker 10: and she's rolling her eyes. On the other hand, as
• 33:59
  Speaker 10: the criminal offense attorney, and you look at it and
• 34:01
  Speaker 10: you say, how in the world can we try this case?
• 34:04
  Speaker 10: A jury is going to hate her, and now we're
• 34:06
  Speaker 10: stuck with one option. We've got to plead her guilty.
• 34:09
  Speaker 10: Why it took so long to get to this point,
• 34:12
  Speaker 10: I don't know, But nonetheless I hope it gives the
• 34:15
  Speaker 10: family some closure to this tragedy.
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know, just because you went through so much,
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: and I want to thank you for that.
• 34:22
  Speaker 13: Mark.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, I know you're a veteran trial lawyer. I
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: know you're a high profile attorney in this jurisdiction. You
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: really went to bat so the truth could come out
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: in this case. I really appreciate it because I've dealt
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: with so many defendants, so many and they act completely
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: differently in front of a jury than they do behind
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: closed doors, Like she is just using her dad up.
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: If I could just have my dad back for five minutes,
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: And the way she's treating her family, her father, the
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: poor guy's just trying to keep his daughter out of jail.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: He's doing anything. I guarantee you had a hand in
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: getting your eye of those last three incidents. It makes
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: me wonder when she says he says more is coming
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: out about what happens you go such as it makes
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: me wonder if there's more to it than I even know.
• 35:14
  Speaker 10: There are multiple layers to that onion, all of which
• 35:19
  Speaker 10: at the core of it is a woman girl that
• 35:25
  Speaker 10: Jess has no grasp on the reality of the situation,
• 35:29
  Speaker 10: the consequences of her action, the eye rolls, the sure
• 35:34
  Speaker 10: I mean, as a parent, to look in your daughter's
• 35:38
  Speaker 10: eyes knowing that she has just killed someone, maybe at
• 35:42
  Speaker 10: this point, maybe even multiple people. You're doing everything you
• 35:46
  Speaker 10: can to get her to understand the gravity of the situation,
• 35:50
  Speaker 10: the consequence of her action, the money that's being spent
• 35:53
  Speaker 10: on experts and lawyers that these parents, grandparents are spending.
• 35:57
  Speaker 10: And yet she sits there and simply acts it's just
• 36:00
  Speaker 10: any other day.
• 36:02
  Speaker 9: This was just a.
• 36:03
  Speaker 10: Tragedy all the way around. In my heart obviously goes
• 36:07
  Speaker 10: out to the Miller family and the Hutchison family.
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: To top it all off, we learn that the drunk
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: driver Homarowski is now insisting the sentence that she just
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: got me thrown out and that she get a lighter sentence.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: Incredible and not in a good way. Joining me now
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: is doctor Kendall Crown's chief medical Examiner Terrant County. That's
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: Fort Worth Esteemed lecturer at the Burnett School of Medicine
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: at TCU. Doctor Kendall crowns, I need you now because
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: all of our focus has been on the duy killer,
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: her sentence, what she did and didn't do in court,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: what she did behind bars. I want to talk about
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: Samantha the bride, the bride who was ejected and thrown
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: one hundred yards in her wedding dress to her death.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: What were her injuries? Doctor Kendall crowns.
• 37:05
  Speaker 18: Her injuries would be very comparable to her husband's injuries.
• 37:09
  Speaker 18: With the multiple extremity fractures, the head injury, and the
• 37:15
  Speaker 18: rate of speed that the golf car was hit at,
• 37:18
  Speaker 18: she probably would have had whiplash injury, cervical spine suspurations.
• 37:22
  Speaker 18: Combined with that internal images of the brain, possible effectors
• 37:26
  Speaker 18: of the ribs and choos in flabrations of lungs, hearts,
• 37:30
  Speaker 18: and other internal.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: Organ duntor crowns. I'm just trying to imagine what the
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: impact must have been because there were no skid marks.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: I think she may have hit the brakes one time.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: But this crash, I can't even make out what that is.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: The car is just a jumble and the bride was
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: thrown one hundred yards plus. I mean, would she have
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: died upon impact.
• 37:58
  Speaker 18: It's possible that she could have dined on impact because
• 38:01
  Speaker 18: the car is coming at such a high rate of
• 38:03
  Speaker 18: speed and striking a golf cart which has a very
• 38:06
  Speaker 18: little crumpled zone, very little protection for the occupants. And
• 38:10
  Speaker 18: the fact she threw one hundred yards means that the
• 38:14
  Speaker 18: decedent was shot out of the vehicle at a high
• 38:18
  Speaker 18: rate of speed and then, depending on how much she weighs,
• 38:21
  Speaker 18: is able to go one hundred yards. So the accident
• 38:24
  Speaker 18: self gave her initial velocity that made her basically into
• 38:27
  Speaker 18: a meat missile that flew through the air until she
• 38:30
  Speaker 18: came to rest one hundred yards later. Odds are she's
• 38:33
  Speaker 18: dead on impact, but you would really have to look
• 38:35
  Speaker 18: at the injuries. My theory is she's probably got massive
• 38:38
  Speaker 18: skull fractures, massive cervical spine fractures, probably killed her instantly
• 38:42
  Speaker 18: and then flung her body one hundred yards.
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: Doctor Kendall Crown's. What about the groom Eric, because he
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: is apparently still undergoing rehab. What were his injuries?
• 38:56
  Speaker 18: So he has fractures of his legs, he has of
• 39:00
  Speaker 18: his I believe his ribs. He also had skull fractures.
• 39:05
  Speaker 18: He had traumatic brain injury, which means basically had hemorrhage
• 39:08
  Speaker 18: in his brain or bleeding his brains from the course
• 39:11
  Speaker 18: of impact. And so all those injuries, especially the brain injuries,
• 39:16
  Speaker 18: he's probably has to relearn how to walk, probably relearn
• 39:19
  Speaker 18: how to talk, and any number of things that go
• 39:22
  Speaker 18: along with brain injuries. And he'll have pain from the
• 39:26
  Speaker 18: fractures and other issues from the brain injuries for the
• 39:32
  Speaker 18: rest of his.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: Life, Doctor Crowns. We know that Samantha was thrown from
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: the wreck one hundred yards declared dead at the same
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: the groom Eric Hutchinson two broken legs, broken bones in
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: his face, and a brain injury. Yet Jamie Kumrowski is uninjured,
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: completely uninjured How does that happen?
• 39:57
  Speaker 18: Doctor, Yeah, so that's always fascinating to me. Have seen
• 40:00
  Speaker 18: these dui type collisions throughout my career, and it's always
• 40:04
  Speaker 18: the person that's hit by the drunk driver. They gets
• 40:07
  Speaker 18: killed and the drunk driver, for whatever reason, has very
• 40:10
  Speaker 18: little to no injuries. It could be that she was
• 40:13
  Speaker 18: seat belted. It could be the fact that her car
• 40:16
  Speaker 18: was heavier than the golf cart. It took a lot
• 40:19
  Speaker 18: less impact damage from the golf cart, because you know,
• 40:22
  Speaker 18: when you hit a human being, you don't usually have
• 40:25
  Speaker 18: injuries to the car itself because the car is like
• 40:28
  Speaker 18: a tank. There's other theories that the drunk person is
• 40:32
  Speaker 18: more relaxed and then on impact, they just don't get
• 40:35
  Speaker 18: the injuries you see with people that are bracing for impact.
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: Doctor Crown's Sam's father had to identify her from her tattoo.
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: That was the only way he could identify her. What
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: does that tell you?
• 40:47
  Speaker 18: She had so much facial and head trauma that her
• 40:51
  Speaker 18: actual head was not identifiable. So she could have had
• 40:56
  Speaker 18: massive skull fractures that cause tearing up her facial and
• 41:01
  Speaker 18: distorting her facial features. Her tag could have been so
• 41:04
  Speaker 18: pressed that you just couldn't make out her face.
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: All of this because of a drunk driving and it
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: was by far not the first time for this woman.
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: Our prayers tonight with Samantha's groom Eric and her family.
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: Nancy Gray signing off goodbye friend,