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Lackawanna man sentenced to prison for accident that killed 3 people

Richard Sawicki pleaded guilty last October to aggravated vehicular manslaughter and four counts of assault.

WARSAW, N.Y. — A Lackawanna man involved in a fatal crash that killed three people in Wyoming County was sentenced in court Thursday. 

Richard Sawicki pled guilty last October to aggravated vehicular manslaughter and four counts of assault.  

The accident happened May 26, 2019 on Mason Road and Route 20 in the Wyoming County town of Varysburg. 

Investigators say Sawicki, who was 20 years old at the time of the accident, left a home on Maxon Road and was speeding when he drove through a stop sign and collided with a minivan that was traveling west on Route 20A.  

Nine people were in the minivan at the time of the accident.  Seven of those people were ejected from the vehicle.  Ondina Castro De La Cruz, 47, Mayelin Brito-Castro, 32 and Kyara Hernandez-Brito, age 4, were killed in the accident. 

“During sentencing one member of the victim’s family spoke on behalf some members of the family and one member spoke on behalf of herself and her children.  It was a highly emotional victim statement that brought both the victim’s family as well as the members of the defendant’s family to tears," said Wyoming County District Attorney Donald O'Geen.  

Sawicki was sentenced to 6-2/3 to 20 years in prison for the aggravated vehicular manslaughter and seven years determinate sentence on each assault count. The sentences will run concurrent.  He will also have serve three years of post-release supervision 

Sawicki also has to pay restitution.

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