A Jefferson County judge has ordered 32-year-old Cesar Hernandez-Sanchez to serve a total of 14 years in the Colorado Department of Corrections for a 2025 State Highway 58 crash in Wheat Ridge that killed one man and seriously injured two others. Hernandez-Sanchez pleaded guilty in March to vehicular homicide and vehicular assault after an investigation into the multi-vehicle wreck.
District Court Judge Christopher Zenisek imposed a 10-year sentence on the vehicular homicide charge and four years on the vehicular assault charge, according to KKTV. Local reporting notes that Hernandez-Sanchez had faced a possible maximum of 18 years and entered his guilty pleas on March 23, 2026.
Crash Details And Victims
Investigators say the crash happened on the evening of October 17, 2025, when Hernandez-Sanchez’s car crossed a dirt median into the eastbound lanes of State Highway 58, slamming head-on into an oncoming vehicle and setting off a four-car chain reaction. Reporting from KDVR via AOL cites investigators who estimated his speed at more than 70 mph and recorded a blood-alcohol level of 0.243 about two hours after the crash.
Wheat Ridge police identified the man who died as Michael Smith. They said two other occupants, Elva Rodriguez and Jose Rodriguez, suffered serious injuries that included fractured vertebrae and multiple broken ribs, according to a post by the Wheat Ridge Police Department. In that post, the department thanked Victim Outreach Incorporated for its support and quoted First Judicial District senior deputy district attorney Jacob Mathews, who called the case “another devastating and entirely preventable loss for our community.”…