A staged auto accident ended in tragedy for the families involved, as a father faces a prison sentence and a grandmother is lost forever.
On September 4, 2003, Hairo Gomez and Jacinto Maldando Jr. planned and executed a two-car staged accident at a busy intersection in Lawrence, Mass. Gomez, 33, drove his car into Maldando's 1992 Acura with the intention of causing enough damage to collect insurance payments, but he ended up causing much more. Maldando's 65-year-old great grandmother Altagracia Arias, who was sitting in the back seat of the Acura, suffered severe head injuries during the collision and died as a result.
Gomez, who is already serving a five-year sentence for drug charges in a New Jersey jail, now faces a new list of charges, more jail time, and deportation to the Dominican Republic upon release from prison. The married father of 4-year-old twins said that executing his role in the scheme was, "…the worst decision I ever made in my entire life."
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