HOMESTEAD, Fla. – A man stood up to defend a woman after a man crashed into her car. A graphic video released on Monday shows how that cost him his life on Wednesday in Homestead.
According to police, the 58-year-old hit-and-run driver of a blue 2023 Chevrolet Equinox struck and killed the 38-year-old man who had placed his hands on his hood and said, “Stop! I saw everything!”
Police officers identified the driver as Ariel Martinez Rodriguez and the victim who was later pronounced dead at the hospital as Jose Francisco De Trinidad.
Detectives suspect Martinez was driving drunk when he was involved in the two hit-and-run crashes.
Martinez’s first hit-and-run crash was when he rear-ended a woman’s 2022 Hyundai Santa Fe at a shopping mall near Southwest 152 Street and Lindgren Road.
After running over De Trinidad, Rodriguez sped southbound on Lindgren Road, according to the arrest report.
Police officers reported finding him near Southwest 184 Street and 147 Avenue, as he was “swerving back and forth within and out of the lane onto the grass on the right side of the roadway.”
A police officer reported that after stopping Rodriguez near Southwest 178 Terrace and 147 Avenue, his breath smelled like “an alcoholic beverage,” he had “bloodshot and watery eyes,” and his “fly was down.”
De Trinidad later died at Jackson Memorial Hospital. Rodriguez confessed to drinking alcohol for two hours, but he said he didn’t remember crashing or running over a man, according to police.
Miami-Dade correctional officers booked Rodriguez shortly before 12:20 a.m., on Thursday, at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.
Rodriguez appeared before Miami-Dade County Circuit Judge Mindy Glazer who denied him bond.
“There was a passenger in a vehicle, a 17-year-old, who took a cell phone video of the defendant at the scene of the crash,” Glazer read aloud in court.
Rodriguez is facing charges of second-degree murder with a deadly weapon, vehicular homicide, and leaving the scene of a traffic crash resulting in death.
Prosecutors were waiting for blood test results to decide whether or not to charge him with DUI manslaughter, a second-degree felony with a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison.
Miami-Dade County records show Rodriguez’s arraignment hearing was set for 9 a.m., on May 15.
Detectives asked anyone with information about this or other cases to call Miami-Dade County Crime Stoppers at 305-471-8477.