SANTA MARIA : Drunk Driver Gets 11 Years in 2 Deaths

As his victims’ relatives wept in the courtroom, a 22-year-old drunk driver was sentenced Thursday to 11 years in prison for killing two women and severely injuring another on the Ventura Freeway.

Arturo C. Quintero could have received 13 years, but even that would not have made up for their loss, several family members told Ventura County Superior Court Judge Allan L. Steele.

“This guy killed my wife,” said Timothy Cranney of Santa Maria, whose wife, Alicia, died in the June 27 crash.

“How do you face a 7-year-old little girl and say her mother was killed by a man who was drinking and driving?” Cranney asked the judge. “He needs to be punished the maximum possible. This has got to stop. It can happen to anyone.”

Quintero, 22, of Panorama City, pleaded guilty last month to gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated in the deaths of Alicia Cranney, 26, and Sonia Schneider, 25, of Santa Barbara. He also admitted causing bodily injury to Jacqueline Antles, 31, of Goleta.

Investigators said the three women were friends who, with Antles’ husband, Robert, were on their way home from watching motorcycle races in Bakersfield when the fatal crash occurred about 3:25 a.m.

Riding north on the freeway in two cars, the group had pulled over just south of the Santa Barbara County line to check a trailer tire when Quintero plowed into the rear of the second car, investigators said.

Quintero was traveling about 85 m.p.h. when he ran off the road, investigators said, with a blood alcohol level estimated at 0.16%--twice the legal limit. He received minor injuries.

As Jacqueline Antles lay pinned under a car, leaking radiator fluid caused burns over 60% of her body, her husband told the judge Thursday. She also suffered a stroke and is in a rehabilitation hospital.

“We were just getting ready to start a family,” Robert Antles said. Now, he said, “she is totally unable to fend for herself. . . . This has destroyed our plans for the future.”

Deputy Public Defender Brian L. Boles said Quintero’s early guilty plea--which spared the families the ordeal of a preliminary hearing and trial--was evidence of his remorse. He suggested a term of six years and eight months.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard E. Holmes argued for the maximum term, noting that Quintero had been convicted of drunk driving in 1990 and “didn’t learn his lesson.”