Garden City woman pleads guilty to running over neighbor

A Garden City woman who ran over a neighbor with her vehicle last year pleaded guilty Friday to two felonies and driving while intoxicated, the Nassau County District Attorney's Office said.

Tara Guinnane, 48, is expected to get 2 to 6 years in prison when she is sentenced March 25 for aggravated vehicular assault, second-degree assault and aggravated driving while intoxicated, a misdemeanor, authorities said.

She told Garden City officers that she was driving back from a supermarket when she hit a man walking home from the train station about 6:15 p.m. Feb. 12, according to court records. It happened on Wilson Street, where she and the victim, 50, lived, authorities said. 

Authorities reported that "signs of intoxication were extremely obvious," the court complaint said. She told officers that she had drunk a "fireball shot" an hour before the collision, the complaint said, and after her Jeep was impounded, four empty mini bottles of Fireball, a cinnamon whiskey, were discovered inside. Two hours after the crash, tests showed a BAC, or blood alcohol concentration, of .18. Drivers are considered drunk if the BAC limit is at least .08.

Guinnane was free on bond. Her attorney did not return requests for comment.  

The collision fractured the victim's orbital socket and caused his brain to bleed, among other injuries, authorities said.

“The defendant was intoxicated — more than twice the legal limit — when she drove an SUV and struck a pedestrian as he walked home from the train station,” District Attorney Madeline Singas said in a news release. “Because of her actions, the victim suffered a traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury —  injuries he has not fully recovered from.”