Andover man sentenced for deadly DUI crash that killed Wichitan, 65, on Thanksgiving
A Sedgwick County judge on Thursday ordered an Andover man to serve 16 years, 8 months in prison for causing a wreck that killed a 65-year-old Wichitan on Thanksgiving in 2021.
Garett Michael Meyers, 38, pleaded guilty in December to involuntary manslaughter and aggravated battery, both while driving under the influence, in the Nov. 25, 2021, crash that killed LeRoy Grim Jr. and injured a Wichita woman. Wichita police have said Meyers was drunk and speeding in a Ford F-250 truck when he rear-ended the Kia Optima that Grim was driving, causing it to flip at 13th and Hillside shortly after 8 p.m.
Grim was westbound and at a traffic light at the time, police have said.
Judge Sean Hatfield imposed the 200-month prison sentence over the objection of Meyers’ defense lawyer, who in a written motion asking for a shorter term called Grim’s death “an accidental killing, with no bad intent.”
Meyers, the lawyer wrote, “did not intend to become intoxicated that day” and felt “extreme remorse immediately.”
Asked by officers who responded to the fatal crash if he knew what had happened, Meyers said, “No, I’m just drunk,” according to an affidavit released by the court. He was so intoxicated after a day of drinking alcohol — he “decided to go have one (drink) and it turned into too many,” the affidavit says he admitted in a jailhouse phone call — that he showed police a grocery store shoppers card and a credit card instead of his driver’s license and needed help getting out of the truck.
Meyers was driving 63 mph in a 35mph zone in the moments before rear-ending Grim, the affidavit says. He also had a suspended license for previously failing a chemical breath test and had been under an interlock ignition restriction at the time, though there was not one in the truck he was driving, according to the document.
