UPPER MARLBORO, Md. – A Prince George’s County Judge handed down a stiff sentence Tuesday to a Beltsville woman convicted of killing two men while driving drunk in 2010. Jenny Mate was given the maximum of 20 years for killing Justo Rosario and Roy Lacayo as they stood outside their cars on Riggs Road last February.

Mate should not have been behind the wheel. She had two prior convictions for DWI and her license was suspended.

Jenny Mate sat and listened Tuesday morning as friends and family of the victims made their way to the witness stand and tried to put into words what they were feeling in their hearts. Some of them held tissues, wiping tears as they talked about Justo and Roy.

Just before 11 pm February 1st 2010, Justo Rosario and Roy Lacayo were exchanging insurance information by the side of the road when Jenny Mate plowed into them at a high rate of speed.

It was a horrific scene with Rosario’s body dragged under Mate’s SUV a hundred feet.
Lacayo died in front of his then 15-year-old brother who was riding with him in the car that night.

In his statement to the judge, prosecutor Saman Danai went through a long list of run-ins Mate has had with the law. Including the fact, Mate had just been convicted of DWI in Montgomery County and was waiting to be sentenced.

“I understand that everybody makes mistakes,” said Anglea Rosario, Justo’s sister,” and they need another chance but miss Mate made too many mistakes.”

Without turning around to face family members in the courtroom, Mate read from papers she held in her hand saying in part, “I apologize for your loss. I am not perfect. I hope you can forgive me for my sins. I’m trying to find peace. I have been suffering from alcohol addiction.”

“How many times do you have to make a mistake?” asked Christie Lacayo, Roy’s widow, in a gathering outside the courthouse, “to get punished for something and just keep doing it over and over again, it has to stop eventually, hopefully it stops now and hopefully for good.”

Maria Rosario, Justo’s sister, listened to the apology but felt it didn’t ring true.

“I was angry because to me it seemed she didn’t really mean her apology,” said Maria Rosario, Justo’s Sister, “she didn’t really care, she didn’t seem to understand the trouble and pain she cause to my family and Roy’s family.”

Roy Lacayo was the father of five.

Justo Rosario, his father said, loved his family so much he wanted to build a house big enough so all of them could live together.

There is no truth in sentencing in Maryland so it’s unlikely Mate will have to serve the entire sentence.
She has a five-year-old son and is pregnant. She’s due in September.