Prosecutors drop charges against man accused in deadly St. Pete crash

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - The family of a woman who was hit and killed by a driver who police said was going nearly 30 miles per hour over the speed limit and ran a red light said they feel like they’ve been punched in the gut again.

The Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney’s Office recently dropped the two counts of vehicular homicide against 21-year-old Owen Whittaker. According to the police report, Whittaker was going 72 mph in a 45 mph zone on Dec. 9 around 2:15 p.m. He didn’t brake before entering the intersection of Fourth Street North and 72nd Avenue in St. Petersburg after the light changed to red, the report says.

He hit another vehicle, sending his car off the road onto the sidewalk where he hit and killed 62-year-old bicyclist Ronald Kimball, and 62-year-old Alicia "Ann" Prather.

RELATED: Pedestrian, bicyclist killed in St. Pete crash, 1 driver charged: SPPD

"We didn’t really even know how to comprehend it," Amanda Dempsey, Prather’s daughter-in-law said. "’Is this really happening,’ I think is what we thought."

"I told her all the time, ‘you’re the greatest mother ever,’" Maurice Dempsey said. "She lived a very simple life, very selfless. I mean, she loved me and my brother ... I mean, I can't even put it into words," he said.

The pain of losing her, Maurice and Amanda said is unbearable, and it was about to get worse. They found out in February that the State Attorney’s Office decided to drop the two counts of vehicular homicide against Whittaker. 

"For me, it was like a punch in the gut. I just felt like the justice system is flawed, and they let us down tremendously," Maurice said. "I felt like the criminal the whole time, like we weren’t the victims …. It’s really very, very devastating."

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Maurice said they found out that the original attorney who was on the case wasn’t on it anymore and that the charges were dropped because he kept calling to check on the case.

"They never called me and told me anything. I had to always call them," he said.

They requested a meeting with the State Attorney’s Office, and said they were told there wasn’t enough evidence to prove criminal intent.

"They said that he was a good kid and that he didn’t have any prior charges, and they didn’t feel like 10 years was fair for him," Amanda said. 

"It was heart-wrenching. I mean, I was literally crying in there and getting so just worked up about it. I started cursing, and they had to tell me to stop using foul language. And I'm like, ‘but you guys really don't understand what we're going through. You're not living this. We are. Our kids now have to live without their grandmother because of decisions that he made, but you're telling me that you don't feel like he deserves any time for the negligence, for the fact he decided to run a red light, and he made that choice to speed,’" she said. 

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"They told us that people speed every day. And I said, ‘yeah, but people don't kill people every day when they're speeding. They don't run red lights while they're speeding to where it kills somebody,’" Amanda said.

The St. Petersburg Police Department said its officers investigated the case and made the arrest on "good faith," believing there was probable cause. A spokesperson said, though, that the State Attorney’s Office has the final decision on whether to take the case to court, and it respects the decision and the process.

"The State Attorney’s Office has a different burden of proof," an SPPD spokesperson said.

FOX 13 reached out to State Attorney Bruce Barlett’s Office and is waiting to hear back. Maurice and Amanda Dempsey are suing Whittaker and his father for damages. 

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