Woman gets seven years in DUI crash that killed biker
The victim's wife was riding with her husband when the woman broadsided his Harley.
By RICHARD RAEKE
Published December 3, 2003
NEW PORT RICHEY - After nearly two years, Sheri Areson just wanted to move on. But the case kept lingering. Every six weeks she would come to the courthouse to hear the latest motions and conferences on Danielle Spinazzola's DUI manslaughter case.
On March 23, 2000, Spinazzola killed Areson's husband, Gary B. Areson Jr., after running a stop sign at Flora Avenue and Alt. U.S. 19.
On Tuesday, Sheri Areson and her sons, Gary and Troy, heard Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Daniel Diskey sentence Spinazzola to seven years in prison, followed by eight years of probation and a lifetime revocation of her driver's license.
"I'm just happy to get it over with," Areson said.
According to the Florida Highway Patrol, Spinazzola, then 30, broadsided the motorcycle ridden by Areson's husband, Gary, who was riding south on Alt. U.S. 19. He was thrown from his motorcycle and died later at Helen Ellis Memorial Hospital in Tarpon Springs. FHP troopers drew Spinazzola's blood after the crash. The tests showed she had a blood-alcohol level of 0.128. Florida law presumes impairment at 0.08.
Sheri Areson, now 37, was there that day on her motorcycle. The couple had been riding their Harley-Davidsons along with six other people. The pack had dwindled to three riders when Gary Areson was hit.
The Aresons owned Joker Custom Cycles in Holiday and a mail-order motorcycle parts business. Sheri Areson said the businesses had become profitable and her husband had ideas of moving the mail-order business and the family to Floral City. In the wake of his death, she had to close down the companies.
Now that the case has concluded, she said she planned on returning to school to become a counselor. As for Spinazzola, she said, "I wish I could hate her, but I don't."
