Exclusive: Sole Survivor Speaks Out After Driver Who Killed Her Family Gets No Jail Time
TEANECK, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- A mother is leaning on her faith after facing the driver who pleaded guilty to the car crash tat killed her husband and four daughters.
"I'll just put everything in God's hands," said Mary Rose Ballocanag. "He will give me the justice I'm always praying for."
She spoke with CBS2 about her disappointment with the sentencing for the wrong way driver, who got no jail time after hitting and killing five members of a family from Teaneck, New Jersey in a minivan.
Police say Alvin Hubbard crossed a median and drove into traffic, going the wrong way in his pickup truck.
CBS2's Alice Gainer was in the courtroom in Delaware and spoke with Trinidad, the only member of the family that survived.
"Today I feel like my family was killed all over again," Mary Rose said. She spoke at Hubbard's sentencing, pleading with the judge for justice, crying as she showed him a picture.
Hubbard also cried, and did not speak in our outside of the courtroom. He was sentenced to one year probation and restitution.
As part of a plea deal agreement, he pleaded guilty to lesser charges: Operating a vehicle causing death and vehicular assault.
Back on July 6, 2018, the Trinidad family was driving back from an Ocean City, Maryland vacation on Route 1 in Delaware when a pickup truck driven by Hubbard veered off, crossed the median, and struck and another car and the minivan the Trinidad family was in. Audie Trinidad, 61, 20-year-old Kaitlyn, 17-year-old Danna and 13-year-old twins Melissa and Allison -- were killed.
Mary Rose was the only one to survive, sustaining multiple injuries.
There were no drugs or alcohol in Hubbard's system. The defense says he was coming back from work from work as a welder with another coworker.
"He got into a bad coughing fit. That coughing fit took over him, and he passed out because of it and that's how this occurred," said Hubbard's attorney John Kirk.
"That's questionable. We never really found out why this happened," said Mary Rose's attorney Diane Lucianna.
While arguing for no jail time, the defense said Hubbard, now 46 and a divorced father of two teens, was "already in a prison of his own sorrow" and read aloud a letter he wrote to Mary Rose apologizing.
"I don't care about the letter. It's not going to bring my family back," Mary Rose said.
She says her entire family was take from her. She's had eight surgeries herself, and will never be able to work as a nurse again.
Extended family and friends rallied around her Friday.
The defense says Hubbard no longer drives and doesn't own a car.
An attorney for Mary Rose says they've reached the end of the road legally.