Driver Sentenced for 4 Highway Deaths
A 27-year-old Rosamond man who killed four people in a Lancaster collision last July was sentenced Tuesday to 13 years and eight months in prison, said Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office.
The sentence was the result of a plea bargain reached in March, when Shawn Eugene Beavers pleaded no contest to two counts of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and one count of driving under the influence of drugs with allegations of great bodily injury.
Beavers was driving 90 to 100 mph on Sierra Highway when his vehicle rear-ended a pickup truck, crossed into incoming traffic and slammed head-on into a sport utility vehicle.
Killed were Mark Rittenberg, 52, and his wife, Mary, 41, both of Palmdale, and Georgina Schmidt, 43, and Therese Frisch, 38, both of Lancaster. Beavers and two others were injured.
Beavers had prior convictions for burglary, receiving stolen property and drug possession.
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