4 days Ago
RAVENEL — Patricia DiGeronimo feared for her life as she sat in her stalled-out car, blocking traffic on an unlit section of U.S. Highway 17 as the clock wound down on Mother’s Day 2022.
Suddenly, she heard a noise like a gunshot ring out and saw a flash, like a transformer blowing, pierce the dark night sky. Nearby, Michael Haug had an even better view of what DiGeronimo later learned was a triple-fatal collision involving the sheriff’s deputy who was coming to her aid. That deputy was Emily Pelletier, who no longer works at the Charleston County Sheriff's Office.
She faces three counts of reckless homicide for the collision that killed Stephanie Dantzler, 53, and her daughters Shanice Dantzler-Williams, 28, and Miranda Dantzler-Williams, 22. Her trial began April 15. Haug testified he saw a split-second flash of blue light before watching Pelletier’s patrol car bounce across Highway 17 and wreck into an embankment.
He jumped out of his truck to check on Pelletier, who was alert and responsive. Deputy Emily Pelletier was fired for violating the law and operating her vehicle in an unsafe manner. As he shined his flashlight around the dark rural road, he realized Pelletier had collided with a black sedan, sending it careening into a utility box and power pole wires.
The impact crumpled the sedan and rearranged the vehicle’s internal compartment, killing all three women before first responders could provide aid. The vehicle was so damaged that the roof had to be removed in order to extract the victims from the wreckage, according to testimony during Pelletier’s jury trial . "The vehicle was completely destroyed," testified William Donahue, a former state Highway Patrol investigator.
He said the driver's side compartment was "almost nonexistent" because of how badly the vehicle had been misconfigured. Betty Simmons and Eric Dantzler hold up photos of their late family members Stephanie Dantzler, Shanice Dantzler-Williams and Miranda Dantzler-Williams at a press conference Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2024, in Charleston.
The tight-knit group of Colleton County women were driving back from a Mother's Day celebration at the time of the collision. The youngest victim had graduated from Claflin University just one day before she died. Prosecutors Jennifer Shealey and Elliott Barrow will try to convince a jury that Pelletier recklessly charged up the dark rural New Road at nearly 30 miles over the speed limit, disobeying traffic laws she should have followed while responding to the call she told dispatch was the lowest level of emergency.
But defense attorneys Frank Cornely and Nathan Williams told the jury during opening statements that “an unimaginable sequence of events led to this tragedy,” one they call an accident. He alluded that the trial would show that Pelletier had upgraded her urgency of response at the time of the collision. He also told the jury they would learn about impaired driving and other circumstances during the trial.
Cornely said in his opening statement that the area Pelletier approached looked to her like a continuation of the road she was driving on — not an intersection with a highway. He said Pelletier never saw any lights or cars. The South Carolina Highway Patrol, which investigated the collision, determined she was traveling at 73 mph at the time of the crash.
Prosecutor Barrow said the defense may try to “divert, distract and deflect from what matters in this case” which, he said, is a deputy who blew through a stop sign. Mother and grandmother to the three women killed in a crash on Mother’s Day in 2022 Betty R. Simmons (left) speaks to members of the media with Darin Dantzler (right) and attorneys representing the families outside the Charleston County Courthouse in Charleston on Wednesday, May 17, 2023.
The victims' family has sued Pelletier and the sheriff's office , alleging that she and another former deputy, Clinton Sacks , were racing to reach DiGeronimo, the driver stalled on the Highway 17 just west of Ravenel. Sacks arrived at the call first, though he never told dispatch he was responding, a dispatcher working that night testified. Both deputies traveled at “outrageous and dangerous speeds” for more than 15 minutes, according to the lawsuit, which is in the middle of an appeals process to determine if the sheriff's office is immune from litigation or not.
First responders testified April 15 that the rookie deputy was in shock after they popped her air bags and cut her seat belt to help remove her from the patrol vehicle following the collision. She appeared to have a “thousand-yard stare," one first responder testified. Now 27, Pelletier sat still and faced forward during the first day of her trial.
She did not turn back to see that more than a dozen members of the victims’ family were clustered on the right side of the courtroom, or to notice that the former sheriff, Kristin Graziano, sat directly behind her..
