A Sammamish woman who mixed wine and sleeping pills before she crashed her Jeep through her lakefront home, killing her husband and son-in-law last year, pleaded guilty Thursday to three felonies and two gross-misdemeanor charges.
A Sammamish woman who mixed wine and sleeping pills before she crashed her Jeep through her lakefront home, killing her husband and son-in-law, pleaded guilty Thursday to three felonies and two gross-misdemeanor charges.
Carol Fedigan, 69, was having dinner with her husband, daughter and son-in-law at their home on Lake Sammamish on May 16, 2014, when she decided to move her Jeep into her driveway from where it was parked across the lane from the house, charging papers say. The other adults remained seated in the dining room.
She took her nearly 3-year-old grandson with her, seating him on her lap behind the wheel of her brand-new Jeep, according to the charges. Neither was wearing a seat belt.
The Jeep plowed through the house, smashed over the dinner table and continued through the house’s rear windows, over a covered patio, down some stairs to a deck and through a railing, with the front end of the Jeep coming to rest in Lake Sammamish, the charges say.
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Fedigan’s husband, David Walker, 70, died at the scene while her son-in-law Sean Berry, 41, suffered a traumatic brain injury and died at Harborview Medical Center two days later, according to the charges.
Her daughter, Megan Berry, 34, suffered facial fractures, a collapsed lung and other injuries, the charges say.
Fedigan and her grandson were not injured, according to charging papers.
She was originally charged in December with two counts of vehicular homicide while driving under the influence, but under a plea agreement, she pleaded guilty to both counts, thereby shaving time off her eventual prison sentence.
Fedigan also pleaded guilty to vehicular assault while driving under the influence, with a minor child enhancement for having her grandson in the Jeep, a factor that automatically adds another year to her prison term. Additionally, she pleaded guilty to DUI and reckless endangerment, both gross misdemeanors.
The state and defense will jointly recommend that she be sentenced to six years in prison, followed by a year on electronic-home detention.
Fedigan, who posted $100,000 bail, will remain out of custody until she is sentenced. She also must continue to wear an alcohol-monitoring device.
Though Fedigan is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 14, Senior Deputy Prosecutor Amy Freedheim said Thursday the parties will ask that her sentencing be continued to a later date.
“This never should have happened,” Walker’s sister, Betty Halley, said Thursday. “I think Dave was afraid of her because of how violent she would get.”
Freedheim wrote in charging documents that detectives learned Fedigan had “a significant alcohol problem” and her family had staged an unsuccessful intervention in an attempt to get Fedigan to seek treatment a few months before the crash.
Fedigan’s blood was drawn four hours after the crash, and her blood alcohol content was measured at 0.091 percent, Freedheim wrote in charging documents, noting it would have been “much higher” at the time of the collision. The amount of Ambien in her system “is inconsistent with a therapeutic dose taken at bedtime the evening before,” according to Freedheim.
According to the charges, a full inspection of the vehicle showed no mechanical or electrical problems before the crash.