Convicted DUI Driver No-Shows Court Date, Surrender Pushed Back Again

INDIO – Gina Garcia who pleaded guilty June 15 to a fatal hit-and-run that killed a pregnant teenager was not in court again.

This is the second time in two weeks she did not appear to begin her 15-year prison sentence due to further complications from surgery she had done August 6.

“If she needed these surgeries that bad, why was she out drinking that night when she should’ve been taking care of her health?” asks Danica Denton’s father, Chuck Denton. “Why wait until she kills two people and wants to go do these surgeries?”

Garcia hit Denton in February as Denton was crossing East Palm Canyon in Cathedral City. Garcia’s blood alcohol level was nearly twice the legal limit.

Her attorney Dean Benjamini told the court Friday morning Garcia had her colon removed. Since then, he says, she has had two follow-up surgeries because of these complications. The most recent follow-up surgery occurred on Wednesday.

Danica Denton’s family and supporters don’t believe it.

“Mrs. Garcia in not Jesus Christ or the Pope,” says Rev. Carl McPeters. “They’re making her to be something unique that she has to be given preferential treatment…That woman will never show up for court. This court knows it. Her attorney knows it. Mrs. Garcia is nowhere in the country.”

To make things worse and more emotional for the Denton family, it was Danica’s nineteenth birthday last week. They visited her grave.

“We went to give closure, but there were no closure to give to her,” says Chuck Denton.

Chuck brought with him two death certificates to court: one for his daughter and one for his unborn grandson. He is fighting to have Garcia charged with a second murder—the baby’s death.

Garcia is scheduled to be in court September 25.