Racine man gets 15-year sentence for fatal DWI hit-and-run
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A Racine, Missouri, man will spend a decade and a half behind bars for a fatal drunken driving hit-and-run.
37-year-old Richard Scott Taylor II was sentenced Monday to 15 years in the Missouri Department of Corrections, the maximum sentence allowed by law for driving while intoxicated involving the death of another person.
Taylor pleaded guilty June 1 in connection with the July 5, 2024, death of 60-year-old Sheldonna Wood.
According to the Missouri State Highway Patrol investigation, Taylor was driving a 2004 Dodge Dakota west on Douglas Fir Road when he went off the roadway and struck Wood, who died at the scene.
Investigators said Taylor then drove away without reporting the crash or stopping to render aid.
Authorities found Taylor the following morning at a home in Carterville. Investigators said he admitted he was driving the truck and had consumed alcohol before the crash.
"There is nothing the justice system can impose to undo the pain caused by the defendant's actions, nor can it restore the life that was lost," Newton County Prosecuting Attorney William Lynch said.
Lynch said the sentence provides accountability while affirming that Wood's life "mattered and the suffering of those left behind is not forgotten.
