Inset: DUI victim Roxanne Bonnoni (GoFundMe). Background: The Boots Bar in Brackenridge, Pa., where Jeffrey Glowatski was allegedly drinking before he killed Roxanne Bonnoni in a drunken car crash, cops say (Google Maps).
A Pennsylvania man who slammed into a partially deaf 11-year-old girl with his Jeep after downing 12 beers — striking her as she crossed the street while playing — has learned his fate.
"God did not decide it was Roxanne's time to die," said Anthony Csizmadia, father of victim Roxanne Bonnoni, at Jeffrey Glowatski's sentencing on Wednesday in Allegheny County, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
"This was a selfish, careless and completely preventable choice," Csizmadia blasted, while asking for the maximum punishment allowed. "The dead cannot cry out for justice, and so it is the duty of the living to do so," he said.
Glowatski, 65, was sentenced to serve three to six months in a county jail after he pleaded guilty to hitting Roxanne, who died, in August 2024. The district attorney's office declined to charge him with homicide by vehicle while driving under the influence and instead filed three counts of DUI and careless driving, according to online court records.
"People who hear that feel like that's insufficient, but the district attorney's office was extremely professional, and they made their decisions based on the facts and the law," Glowatski's attorney, David Shrager, told local ABC affiliate WTAE after the sentencing. "The judge sentenced based on the facts and the law, as he should."
Glowatski admitted to hitting Roxanne just moments after he left the Boots Bar in Brackenridge. He drank at two different bars that day before the crash, according to prosecutors.
Roxanne was playing in front of her Harrison Township home on Kuntz Street when Glowatski plowed into her around 7:30 p.m., according to local CBS affiliate KDKA. Glowatski's criminal complaint, which was obtained by the Tribune-Review, detailed how he began tossing beers back around 2:45 p.m. and didn't stop until about 7:15 p.m., when he left Boots Bar after allegedly drinking five 12-ounce servings.
The complaint alleged that Glowatski got into his Jeep Patriot and mowed Roxanne down within minutes of departing from the bar. At least one witness saw the crash unfold and approached Glowatski's vehicle afterward.
"I told him to turn the car off and give me the keys," Jack Howard told the Tribune-Review. "I didn't want him to leave."
According to the complaint, Glowatski spoke to officers who were called to the scene. Police said his speech was slurred and he refused to take sobriety tests.
Additional testing was done through the execution of a search warrant. Glowatski's blood alcohol level turned out to be nearly double the legal limit — 0.153%, according to police.
"Her father put it best. This was not an accident," said Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Edward J. Borkowski before sentencing Glowatski, per the Tribune-Review.
"This was a choice," Borkowski said. "The sentence has to reflect the death and the impact on the remaining family members."
Roxanne was killed two months before her 12th birthday, according to her family. "The future I dreamed for my daughter — her learning, her laughter, her curiosity, and her joy — is gone," said Roxanne's mom, Amber Bonnoni, in court on Wednesday. "Her life was full of hope," Bonnoni added. "Her laughter mattered. Her giggles mattered. Her dreams mattered."
Csizmadia told the court that there was "not a single day that goes by" that he doesn't think of her and "the hugs that I will never get to feel again," per the Tribune-Review.
"The sound of her voice. The way she looked at me," Csizmadia said. "Since her death, my life has been permanently changed. The pain of losing a child never goes away."
A family member described on GoFundMe how Csizmadia was home that night of the crash and watched everything unfold.
"Her father … witnessed it happen and rushed to her, picking her up, holding her, and calling for help," the GoFundMe description said. "This horrible person robbed them of her. The parents and siblings were not even permitted to see or touch her. Only under a sheet to speak and maybe say a prayer."
Roxanne attended DePaul School and was getting ready to start classes at Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf before she was killed. Her family noted in her obituary how she had "aspirations" of being a cheerleader and soccer player.
"This was a tragic situation and has changed many lives forever," said defense attorney Frankie Exler, who also represented Glowatski. "And the reality is that two things can be true at the same time; Mr. Glowatski did get behind the wheel of a vehicle and drive that day after drinking, yet this accident was merely that, an accident."