CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (WDEF)- “I was in shock.”
Day two of the Randy Vega trial began with new footage of the incident that left 41 year old Ana Posso Rodriguez and her one year old son Jonathan Delvia dead.
Vega is charged with nine different criminal counts including two counts of vehicular homicide while intoxicated in that fatal crash on Frazier Avenue on the Chattanooga Northshore on November 25, 2023.
It ultimately led to the restriping of Frazier Avenue from four to two lanes.
The main new video came from the dashcam of Dr. Patrick McGinty, the driver of the truck whose vehicle collided with Vega’s minivan before it crashed into the Walnut Bridge Gift Shop.
Dr. McGinty, a physician at Erlanger, said he felt fear before the incident from Vega.
McGinty described mere seconds before the crash that, “As I was looking to see who was in the car, I was able to see that he was staring back at me. It was an intense stare that startled me.”
Preceding this, his dashcam showed Vega pulling out in front of him on Cherokee Boulevard a few blocks before the crash.
This was after Chattanooga Police investigator Chris Mullinix said Vega had blown through a stop sign at Kent Street and Spears Avenue.
Dr. McGinty says he had to avoid Vega at this point in his drive to work.
However, he says the situation escalated at Woodlawn Avenue, the stoplight before the intersection where the tragic crash occurred.
Prosecutor Sean Boers asked him, “Were you trying to fight the other driver?”
Dr. McGinty responded, “No.”
Boers asked, “What were you trying to do?”
Dr. McGinty said, “I was trying to get away. To end my contact with him.”
The footage goes on to show Vega’s minivan colliding with Dr. McGinty’s truck, sending Vega right into the Walnut Bridge Gift Shop.
Dr. McGinty was never criminally charged for his role in this incident, although he was a party to a civil settlement that involved the victim’s family.
The crash immediately caused chaos in the surrounding area.
Witness John Skiles, who was nearby holding a ‘free hugs, free prayers’ sign on the Walnut Street Bridge described, “I thought it was two teenagers or something drag racing is what I thought. They were going so fast for the conditions.”
Another witness, Jonathan DuBois, who was visiting Chattanooga on that Thanksgiving weekend from North Carolina, said, “I heard a loud bang from the bridge and knew it was a crash.”
DuBois responded to the scene and described catastrophic injuries that both Ana Rodriguez and Jonathan Delvia both suffered.
He said he told one woman, “She isn’t going to make it.”
Chattanooga Police Officer Sarah Cortese conferred this by saying she was pronounced dead on the scene.
Her husband, Octavio Paz, was the lone survivor of his family, and previously testified on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Vega got out of his vehicle, where first responders made contact with him.
That interaction was caught on the body cam of Chattanooga Police Officer Sarah Cortese, which became tense.
A Chattanooga firefighter asked, “What’s your name sir?”
After no response, the firefighter started reaching into Vega’s pockets to try to find identification.
Vega, who had sitting on the sidewalk, occasionally groaning in pain over the course of several minutes, looked at the firefighter and said, “What are you doing man?”
This sparked a rapid back and forth as the firefighter responded, “I’m looking to see what your name is.”
Vega responded, “I didn’t give you permission to look at my wallet!”
The firefighter told Vega, “You don’t have to give me permission.”
Vega, getting agitated, tells the firefighter, “I do have to give you (expletive) permission!”
Officer Cortese said that she detained Vega at the scene due to this conduct.
Cortese said, “I didn’t like the way that he was speaking… and was afraid this would cause the scene to escalate.
This prompting tense questioning from Vega’s public defenders, as Vega’s attorney Andrea Hayduk asked why she detained someone, “Who was so hurt he needed to spend four nights in the ER?”
Dr. McGinty said that he has second thoughts on if should have attempted to get away from Vega, as Vega’s defense questioned why he felt fear from Vega in the first place.
The doctor said, “In hindsight, it’s easy to say that, but I couldn’t have known it was the wrong decision at the time when I was trying to defend myself.”
He added he checked on both victims in this crash, saying that he “felt like he was kicked in the chest and going to pass out” after seeing the condition of the child victim, Jonathan Delvia.
Joe Warren, a crash investigator for Chattanooga Police, said that based on his reconstruction of the crash, Vega was going roughly 52 m.p.h while Dr. McGinty was going 49 m.p.h.
The speed limit at the time on Frazier Avenue was only 35 m.p.h, and since its restriping, is down to 25 m.p.h.
Warren said that he estimates there was about a half second of contact in a side swipe collision.
The prosecution will continue its case on Day 3 of this trial on Thursday.
