Milwaukee man's street racing killed 2, prosecutors say
Milwaukee man's street racing killed 2, prosecutors say
"People should be pissed that this is going on." That's the message from a Milwaukee woman calling for change after losing her only daughter and boyfriend in a crash last August. Police say the striking driver, charged with reckless homicide, was drag racing.
MILWAUKEE - It’s not just rising gun violence taking lives in Milwaukee. One woman wants to bring attention to the deadly impact of reckless driving.
In August 2021, a crash near 76th and Silver Spring Drive changed Sandra Jefferson's life in the blink of an eye.
"My daughter was only 21," said Jefferson. "She loved life."
Jefferson wasn’t there when her only daughter, Danielle, was killed, but the pain hit all the same.
"She was a 4.0 student. I was so proud of her," said Jefferson. "It will hit me, and I have to realize my babies are gone."
Jefferson's boyfriend, Neil McCarthy, is gone, too, in the same car with her daughter when they were killed in the car crash.
"Twenty-nine years we were together," said Jefferson.
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"We’ll never have our loved ones again," said Genie McCarthy, Neil McCarthy's sister.
According to police, Michael Howard, 25, who had a suspended license, hit them while street racing. Witnesses told police he was going too fast, guessing 80, before he got to the intersection where the speed limit was 35. He told police he was racing his friend, according to court documents.
"Death is final," said Jefferson. "Sometimes I have accepted, it but a whole lot of times, I have not accepted the fact that these two right here, who were everything to me, I’ll never, ever see again."
Jefferson knows how quickly life can change.
"Knowing that your loved one can be just wiped out over something so petty and so stupid, to drag race on a busy street, people should be pissed that this is going on," said Jefferson.
She and McCarthy's sister don’t only want consequences for Howard, now charged with two counts of reckless homicide, but also for a second driver racing with him. According to police, a second driver was arrested the day of the crash but never charged.
"It’s going to be hurting us all our lives," said McCarthy. "I just feel for all the other people in the community that have lost family this way. So many people are hurting."
"It upsets me because if you had a part in murdering my people, my family, you should go to prison," said Jefferson.
With how much has been taken from her, Jefferson wants to do whatever it takes to put a stop to reckless driving.
"Where’s the outrage?" said Jefferson. "Because every day that nobody talks about this, really, you have the potential to have someone like me in a chair going through excruciating pain."
Howard has a pre-trial court date Wednesday, June 8, which Jefferson and McCarthy said they plan to attend.
According to court documents, Howard has been convicted of operating after suspension seven times since 2017 and speeding six times.
FOX6 News reached out to the attorney listed for Howard who said he had no comment for this story.