PHOENIX — Twenty-four-year-old Annaleah Dominguez has been sentenced to three years in prison in the 2017 death of a cyclist at South Mountain.
Dominguez admitted to drinking and smoking throughout the night before the deadly crash that killed 36-year-old Robert Dollar.
Dollar was on a bicycle ride the Sunday morning he was struck and killed.
Cyclists are outside the courthouse waiting to hear the sentence for Annaleah Dominguez who plead guilty of hitting & killing cyclist Rob Dollar in 2017.
— Elenee Dao (@Elenee_Dao) October 14, 2022
She admitted to being under the influence that day. Since Rob’s death, the family started a foundation in his name. @abc15 pic.twitter.com/Hwnmdt7vmQ
Since Dollar's death, family and friends started the Rob Dollar Foundation, which promotes education for drivers and bicyclist safety. The foundation also holds a yearly memorial bike ride in Rob's honor. This year's ride is on Sunday, October 23.
"To bring awareness to the motorist, to give these people [bicyclists] three feet," said John Dollar, Rob's father. "Three feet is not something we're asking for. It's the actual law."
It’s been a long excruciating five years since Rob’s death and the family has waited for justice ever since.
With the conviction on Friday, his friends and family still don’t believe it’s enough.
“It’s like part of your heart gets ripped right out of your body and it doesn’t fill in. It’s there, never goes away. We’re going on five years of his death and that pain is still there every single day,” said John Dollar, Rob’s dad after the sentencing.
The sentencing came down just two weeks before the fifth anniversary of Rob’s death. John said this month is usually a difficult time for them.
“We needed this to end. Even though it wasn’t the proper time for us, at least we got some type of closure,” John said.
Several of Rob’s friends and family testified before the judge handed down the sentence. Dominguez sat through it all, getting tearful at times, too.
“This was the worst day of my life, when she killed my son, she killed a part of me. I have not been right since,” Cindy Suttles, Rob’s mother, testified.
On that morning, Kevin Harsley rode with Rob. Had he not taken longer to get down the mountain that morning with Rob, Harsley wouldn’t be here now either.
“I consider myself to be lucky here today, but obviously I was, you can’t really put into words when you come around the corner and you see obviously the scene of an accident and as I’m going around the corner, realize that it’s Rob. Rob, I was just riding with,” Harsley said.
Dominguez originally faced a manslaughter charge. However, through a plea agreement, she then faced a negligent homicide charge. Dominguez plead guilty to the negligent homicide charge a few months ago. The charge’s penalty ranged from one year in prison to three years and nine months. Dominguez’s family pleaded with the judge for the minimum.
“My daughter walks around as a half of a shell she normally is. She will never ever be the same. For someone to say she does not she remorse, we see every single day,” Dominguez’s mom said to the judge.
Right before the judge sentenced Dominguez, she apologized to the Dollar family.
“I just wanted to let everyone know that there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about or realize the suffering that my actions have caused to the Dollar family and the biker community. I just want to say I’m deeply sorry about that,” she said.
Imani Davis became close with the Dollar family following Rob’s death. He didn’t know Rob, but saw him on the road that morning. He also felt for the Dollar family as a cyclist himself.
“She only got three years. And you can call it justice because she’s going to go to prison but he’s never coming back,” Davis said.
Bikers like Kim Rendek, who cycled with Rob, said that day changed her life.
“Just realizing how vulnerable we are out there on the roads, just it was shocking to all of us. Since his passing, we’ve all tried to make our roads safer,” she said.
