Silicon Valley Man - With One Prior DUI - Gets 47 Years For Drunk-Driving Deaths

A Sunnyvale man was sentenced to 47 years and six months in prison Friday for three counts of second-degree murder stemming from a drunk-driving incident that occurred in 2013, prosecutors said.

Dennis Demacedo, 30, will be about 75 when he’s eligible for parole in 2060, according to San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe.

Demacedo was already on probation for a DUI conviction in 2010 when he got behind the wheel after five hours of drinking beer with friends at a Daly City pizzeria on the night of March 9, 2013, prosecutors said.

After rear-ending a vehicle at a stop sign in a hit-and-run, Demacedo took off at 60 mph in a 30 mph zone and broadsided a second vehicle, pushing it 150 feet and killing three of the vehicle’s four occupants, according to prosecutors. A blood test revealed a blood-alcohol content of 0.18 percent, more than twice the legal limit, according to prosecutors.

Defense attorney Geoff Carr said this case was tried as a “Watson homicide,” where malice is implied by the defendant’s prior record of driving under the influence.

“This is effectively the rest of his natural life, and I have a hard time with that,” Carr said. “This guy only had one prior DUI, not eight or ten.”

“That’s what this trial was about,” Carr said. “We were arguing that it was manslaughter and not technically murder, but we lost.”

Prosecutors said that after Demacedo’s first DUI conviction, he committed perjury by falsifying documents filed with the Department of Motor Vehicles.

“When he had his license suspended he went in and applied for and received another license,” Wagstaffe said. “He did that twice.”

Demacedo pleaded no contest to the perjury charges, so Judge Mark Forcum took two years off the maximum sentence, which could have been 49 years and six months, according to prosecutors. He’s already served 735 days, but will not receive time off for good behavior as this is a murder case, according to Wagstaffe.

--Bay City News

--Shutterstock image

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