Driver in traffic fatality is sentenced to 5 years

5/7/2004

FINDLAY - A Findlay motorist has been sentenced to five years in prison for his role in an automobile crash that killed a passenger in his car last year.

Thomas Mauricio, 24, pleaded guilty in February to aggravated vehicular homicide stemming from the Sept. 10, 2003, death of Andrew Bechstein, 24, of Findlay.

Mauricio was westbound on Marion Township Road 208 when the car he was driving went off the road and struck a tree.

At the time, his blood-alcohol level was 0.252 percent, more than three times the legal limit.

During the sentencing Wednesday, Hancock County Common Pleas Judge Reginald Routson also permanently suspended Mauricio's driver's license.