DANE COUNTY, Wis (WKOW) -- The woman responsible for killing a man on his way to work in a fatal crash was sentenced.
Shawnicia Youmas has been found guilty of homicide by negligent operation of a vehicle back in February. She was sentenced to two years and six months in state prison and four years of extended supervision.
She hit and killed Gene Purcell on July 27, 2021, while he was riding his motorcycle to work. He was the director at Wisconsin Public Media.
Gene's brother, David Purcell, had an emotional testimony at Friday's sentencing.
"Regarding the impact this person and convicted felon did was nothing short of setting off a bomb in our lives in our family. The impact that the killing of Gene has had on my life has been truly incalculable. It's hard to know how to fully express the pain, sorrow, grief, malaise and despondence it has caused," he said.
A co-worker of Gene's, Marta Bechtol, remembers the day that Gene was killed. Youmas' car hit the power generator of their building.
"[Gene] was coming here to meet with me, and the lights went out in the building and then came back on suddenly," she said.
After the car made impact, Bechtol rushed to the downstairs of the building to make sure other employees weren't harmed by broken glass from the windows. That is when she saw Gene laying in the road.
"He was an incredible human. He just really was the best kind of person, the best kind," Bechtol said.
Prior to his time at Wisconsin Public Media, Gene was a radio host and a radio teacher at University of Wisconsin Lacrosse. He also taught in the journalism school and was the director of the student radio station and the campus radio station.
Wisconsin Public Media will be opening a new radio station this summer in Rice Lake in honor of Gene. It will be called WEPP, after Eugene Patrick Purcell.
More at WKOW 27 News