Teen gets 4 years for fatal DUI crash
Ramiro Granados started drinking about the time he was old enough to drive a car.
Not long afterward, as he sped drunk down the streets of Inverness, his habit took the life of his best friend and seriously injured another.
Granados, now 18, pleaded guilty in August to two counts of aggravated DUI and one charge of reckless homicide -- taking responsibility, his lawyer says, for the July 2006 night when he crashed his 1999 Mitsubishi Galant with a blood-alcohol level of .119.
On Tuesday morning, the Carpentersville teen was sentenced to four years in prison for the crimes, as his parents and girlfriend -- now five months pregnant with his child -- wiped away tears.
"There will come a time that you're released from prison, and there will come a time when you're tempted to drink and drive again," Cook County Judge John Scotillo told Granados. "You'll need to remember your friends when that time comes."
Granados turned to look at his family after Scotillo announced the sentence; he flashed a quick thumbs-up and gave a meager smile.
Beforehand, he faced the judge and offered an apology.
"I'm very sorry for what happened," he said. "I never meant to cause any harm."
But Granados "chose to drink, and then he chose to drive with his friends in the car," Assistant State's Attorney Shelly Anderson argued.
That July 24, 2006, decision caused a crash near Dundee Road and Glencrest Drive that killed 21-year-old Saul Jimenez of Carpentersville -- the teen's best friend -- and seriously injured passenger Jacquelyn Pereznegron, 18, a friend from Algonquin. At the August court appearance, she had a rod in her right leg.
Neither she nor any family members of the victims were in court Tuesday. Anderson said they'd declined to speak.
Granados, who had four other counts of aggravated DUI dropped as part of his plea deal, already has served 438 days in jail; that will count toward his new sentence. He was given two concurrent four-year terms for the crimes.
Granados' lawyer, D.J. Tegeler, had lobbied for probation, saying his client also will have to live with the tragic outcome of his choices for the rest of his life.
"It's just a sad situation," Tegeler said. He added that Granados "feels horrible. He has killed his best friend."
Scotillo said he took that remorse into account in determining the sentence.
But he again noted the serious outcome of Granados' actions and said he thinks the teen "has a history of thinking only of himself."
Granados has had run-ins with the law before for underage drinking and driving without a license twice. He also has a speeding offense, according to prosecutors.
Granados was released on bond last fall for the drunken driving crime and placed on electronic monitoring as he continued classes at Dundee-Crown High School. But he landed back in jail after being arrested for aggravated discharge of a firearm -- an unrelated incident that happened months before the fatal car crash, Tegeler said.
That's being handled out of Kane County, Tegeler said.