Authorities in Seattle, Washington say they solved a fatal hit-and-run that happened March 19 at a store parking lot. Ashly Nichole Calixto, 33, and Larry Wayne Miller Jr., 42, charged with first-degree murder, second-degree arson, and tasking a motor vehicle without permission in the second degree, according to Q13 Fox.
Prosecutors say they’re behind a mysterious hit-and-run that took the life of Lori Tate, 52. The victim was at a Fred Meyer location with her son in the Ballard neighborhood, buying some plants, officials said. She was going back to her car when she was struck by the suspect vehicle. The case went unsolved for weeks, and the Crime Stoppers put up a reward for tips leading to the identification or the driver or passenger. The suspect vehicle was described as a stolen 2004 gold Toyota Tacoma, which was found burned out in the city of Burien.
“The sense of loss that we didn’t ask for is going to be profound,” the boy’s uncle David Link told the outlet in a March 27 report. “It’s gonna be a lifelong grieving. It’s not just this unbelievable sadness that we’re experiencing now, but to take away a mother, to take away a wife, to take away a loved sister and somebody so close to all of her siblings and just this unbelievable person is just unforgivable. The thing about loss is you go from profound sadness to this extreme anger, especially in cases like this where there is no solution yet. We need to find out what’s going on and that might help close this for everybody involved.”
Detectives said they got a tip from a cooperating witness that said he was smoking meth with the defendants the morning. According to authorities, this person said that Calixto and Miller told him they were planning to do some work, which he assumed meant illegal activities like robberies.
Records viewed by Law&Crime show that the defendants are behing held at King County Jail in lieu of $2 million.
[Screengrab of the Fred Meyer location via KING5]