The man who police say killed four people in a violent wrong-way crash on I-95 made his first appearance in court Thursday where a judge set his bond at $100,000.
Still confined to a wheelchair for injuries suffered in the April 3 crash, 25-year-old Willie Dumel appeared before Miami-Dade Judge Dava Tunis to face four counts of vehicular homicide.
Tunis set his bond at $25,000 on all four counts, but Dumel will remain behind bars without bond on a previous probation warrant. Prosecutors had asked for $400,000 bond.
If Dumel gets the probation warrant cleared and posts bond, he would be placed on house arrest with a GPS monitor, Tunis said.
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Dumel was arrested by the Florida Highway Patrol Wednesday after spending the past month at Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood while recovering from two broken legs he suffered in the crash.
Police said Dumel was traveling northbound in the southbound lanes of the highway between Ives Dairy Road and Hallandale Beach Boulevard when he crashed head-on into a minivan, killing four family members inside.
“No matter what happens in this court case, it’s not going to bring them back to life. And obviously Mr. Dumel has much sympathy over what happened,” said his attorney, Andrew Rier, out of the courtroom on Thursday.
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The incident had started with a police pursuit of Dumel that began in Opa-locka when an officer spotted suspicious activity and tried to stop Dumel, police said.
Dennis Ryan Rinon Ortiz, 33, of California was driving the minivan at the time of the crash, the FHP said. Lily Marie Azarcon, 26, of the Philippines and siblings Albertson Anthony Almase, 31, and Kristina A. Almase, 26, were the minivan passengers who were also killed in the crash.
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