Driver sentenced to prison after woman dies in crash during Pierce County police pursuit

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A 41-year-old man fled a traffic stop for expired tabs in Spanaway earlier this year and hit two cars before law enforcement disabled his vehicle, causing it to spin and flip, severely injuring a passenger who later died.

Jacob Eugene Wyant pleaded guilty Tuesday to DUI vehicular homicide for the Aug. 20 incident that led to the death of 39-year-old Roxanne Bagnariol. Pierce County Superior Court Judge Timothy Ashcraft sentenced him to seven years in prison.

Wyant was driving a red Chevy Tahoe with two passengers at 176th Street East and Pacific Avenue South when a Sheriff's Department deputy activated his vehicle's overhead lights to make a stop, according to charging documents. Wyant went east on 176th, ran a red light and collided with a vehicle.

He continued driving and then did a loop to go west on 176th, according to the Sheriff's Department. Wyant then caused another collision on Spanaway Loop Road. A pursuing deputy performed a PIT maneuver, and the Tahoe spun out and hit a curb, causing it to flip into the brush. The front-seat passenger, Bagnariol, was ejected from the vehicle, which landed on her, deputies said.

Emergency responders got Bagnariol out from under the Tahoe, and she was transported to a hospital in critical condition. Bagnariol died from her injuries Aug. 25.

Two other drivers were injured in the wrecks Wyant caused, a Sheriff's Department spokesperson previously said.

Deputies asked Wyant at the scene why he took off, and, according to charging documents, he said he panicked because he had warrants. Records state he had two active warrants in Washington and one from Texas. He has prior felony convictions, including two convictions for first-degree theft in Oregon.

Four people attended Wyant's sentencing hearing Tuesday afternoon in support of Bagnariol. She was a mother to three children and was from the Kent and Auburn areas. A relative said she was a granddaughter of a former speaker of the Washington House of Representatives, John Bagnariol.

Roxanne Bagnariol's aunt, Theresa Fawcett, addressed the court. She said she wanted Wyant to use his time while he is incarcerated to do everything he can to make amends for his actions and choices.

"And when you get out to please do everything you can to stay right for Roxanne and all victims of people that make such bad, silly, stupid choices that lead to such horrible consequences," Fawcett said.

Wyant's defense attorney from the Department of Assigned Counsel, Kelsey Page, said her client recognized that Bagnariol's death was the result of his choices that disregarded the risk put to those in his vehicle, other drivers on the road and pursuing police officers. She said since she met Wyant he had expressed a desire to take full responsibility.

"I think that it's undisputed, really, that if Jacob was sober on this day, none of this would have happened," Page said. "This was a direct result of his addiction that led him to make choices that, if he had been sober, would have never been made."

Wyant admitted to being under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs in his guilty plea statement. According to court records, deputies found a small container in his pants pocket containing chunks of a white substance Wyant said was fentanyl when he was arrested. His blood was drawn for toxicology testing, but results were not available in court records.

Page read a letter to the court that Wyant wrote. In it, the defendant stated he and Bagnariol spent almost every day together, and he wouldn't have ever purposefully hurt her. He wrote that words couldn't express how he felt, and not a day goes by without him wishing that he would have died instead of her. He added that he looked forward to remaining sober and staying on the path to a new productive life he could be proud of.



After the letter was read, Wyant, who became emotional during the hearing, spoke to the court himself. "I just want to say sorry to her family," Wyant said. "I don't know what else I can say other than that. I just wish none of this would have ever happened."

Ashcraft then imposed the sentence, a punishment in the middle of the standard range, which was 6.5 to 8.5 years, and which prosecutors and the defense agreed to recommend. As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors agreed to drop charges of failure to remain at an injury accident and attempting to elude a pursuing police vehicle.

After court adjourned, Bagnariol's aunt, Lori Hatch, told The News Tribune she and other relatives had attended every court hearing. Today they brought with them a pink, green and white pillow with a photo of a younger Bagnariol printed on it, a picture from when she was pregnant with her first daughter.

"This is really, this is her spirit," Fawcett said.

Bagnariol had been homeless for several years, relatives said, so they hadn't been in close contact with her for some time. But Fawcett said she was loved, and her family never stopped caring for her and wanting her to get better. She said having people like Wyant in her life wasn't helping her.

Hatch said it spoke to her heart that Wyant was willing to plead guilty and not put the family through a trial, and she could tell he was remorseful.

Asked what they thought of law enforcement's role in the incident, Fawcett said she didn't think they had done anything wrong. She said Wyant had already hurt other people, and they had to stop him.

"As a family we don't blame the police at all," Hatch said. "We thank them for doing their job."

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