The Aurora fire chief’s wife will spend a night in the county jail as punishment for a hit-and-run accident that injured a child.
Adriene Garcia, who is married to Fire Chief Mike Garcia, also received two years of probation, 200 hours of community service and 10 days of home detention. She must attend drug and alcohol counseling, said Mark Hulbert, assistant district attorney in the 18th Judicial District.
She was sentenced Friday on a vehicular-assault charge by Judge Frederick Martinez.
Prosecutors had asked for a 90-day jail sentence.
“We felt the severity of the crime warranted 90 days in the county jail,” Hulbert said. “But we know this judge is a thoughtful judge.”
In May, Garcia slammed her Nissan Pathfinder into the back of a Hyundai that was stopped at a traffic light at the intersection of East Yale Avenue and South Peoria Street.
Police found her about 20 minutes after the crash and about 4½ miles from where the accident happened.
She had called her husband, who called police.
During a February court hearing, a prosecutor said the incident was , whose officers allowed Garcia to leave the scene with her husband without being tested for intoxication.
The fire chief testified during that hearing that he did not influence the police investigation.
Adriene Garcia, her husband and her attorney, Danny Foster, all have said she had suffered from two traumatic brain injuries in her life that had caused her to be disabled.
The impact of caused a cognitive episode that led her to drive away, Foster said.
Adriene Garcia was on multiple medications, including 13 that caused impairment, at the time of the crash.
She apologized to the child’s family during her guilty plea. She also told the judge she had not driven since the accident.
Noelle Phillips: 303-954-1661, nphillips@denverpost.com or twitter.com/Noelle_Phillips
