Eight Year Sentence for Fatal Hit-and-Run
5/24/2018
By Cory Shaffer, cleveland.com
CShaffer@cleveland.com
A 23-year-old Garfield Heights woman was sentenced to eight years in prison Thursday for the November hit-and-run death of a 9-year-old Euclid girl who was walking to school.
Lacynthia Tidmore, who showed little emotion throughout the hearing, broke into tears when Common Pleas Judge Peter Corrigan announced that he was sending her to prison for striking De'Zyer Mays and driving away from the scene.
Tidmore pleaded guilty in April to vehicular manslaughter and leaving the scene of an accident charges, both felonies.
Corrigan imposed the maximum sentence of eight years.
The girl was on her way to Euclid Preparatory School where she was in third grade about 7 a.m. Nov. 9. She crossed the street near Babbitt Road and East 232nd Street when Tidmore struck her. The girl suffered multiple injuries, including a broken neck.
Tidmore then stopped at a gas station in Cleveland on East 185th Street to get gas and joked with the clerk, who was related to to the girl's family, about the damage to her car. She called police later that day to arrange her surrender.
Prosecutors say telephone records showed that Tidmore was using her cellphone at the time of the crash.
De'Zyer lived for 14 days in the hospital before she eventually died.