Time hasn’t softened mother’s anger at woman convicted of killing son in violent crash
Time hasn’t healed Maria Romero.
Almost three years after her son’s life was taken when a driver high on fentanyl and cocaine crashed into her car at almost twice the speed limit, Romero hasn’t come close to forgiveness.
“I wish for you to live out your sentence, only to be let out old and dilapidated,” Romero said in Miami-Dade Circuit Court Monday, anger dripping from her mouth as she spoke directly to Catherine Capozzi, 62, who pleaded guilty to the crime. “The only satisfying moment [I’ve had since the accident] was when you asked for a furlough to see your 90-year-old mother and the judge denied it.”
Romero lashed out at Capozzi Monday morning during an impact statement that capped off an emotional 33 months for friends and family since the death of her 15-year-old son, Joel Josue Romero. Romero, who drove the car struck by Capozzi, survived after a three-week medically induced coma. She didn’t learn of her son’s death until she was awakened.
“You decided to get high and get behind the wheel of a car. No matter what we do today, he’s not coming back,” Joel’s grandmother Nancy Albear said during the hearing. “I hope you deal with this for the rest of your life.”
Capozzi agreed to a 15-year prison sentence with additional community service and seven years of probation. She was convicted of reckless vehicular homicide, DUI with serious bodily injury and DUI manslaughter.
Capozzi, who was seated in a corner of the courtroom in a wheelchair, didn’t utter a word as she was led away from the hearing. She was already wearing an orange jumpsuit, having spent the better part of a year behind bars after violating the terms of her house arrest before an agreement was reached.
Monday’s testimony brought some relief to Joel’s family, who also endured Capozzi moving onto the same floor in the same Sunny Isles Beach building where they lived, after the crash, but before the sentencing. Romero was so distraught, she told the court, that the family moved to another apartment in Miami Beach.
On the afternoon of Sept. 18, 2019, Romero had pulled her black Nissan onto the median of I-95 South, near the 95th Street exit. She said she was taking her son to see her sister-in-law, who is a hair stylist when the car was rear-ended, but she can’t recall why she stopped on the median.
“Joel wanted curly hair just like his father,” Romero said.
The black box recovered from the Capozzi’s Dodge Challenger showed she hit the brakes less than a second before the crash and that she was traveling at 90 miles per hour, police determined.
When police arrived — the crash so severe it hurled one vehicle across seven lanes of traffic and another onto the grass alongside the highway — they found Capozzi on the ground twitching like a “zombie,” they said. A subsequent toxicology test showed she was under the influence of fentanyl and cocaine at the time of the crash. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue gave her Narcan to survive.
Her arrest warrant wasn’t issued until Feb. 12, 2020. A week later and almost five full months after the crash, Capozzi was charged with several felonies including DUI manslaughter. She eventually agreed to the 15-year sentence.
Roseline DeLeon, a school friend of Joel’s, also addressed Capozzi during Monday’s hearing. She told the woman that despite the accident, Joel remained with her.
“He is with us right now,” DeLeon said. “While your consequences are coming your way.”
