Oakdale woman gets nearly 3-year sentence for drunken hit-and-run that killed teen in Bloomington

An Oakdale woman apologized through tears in court Tuesday for driving drunk and killing a 17-year-old boy and injuring his teenage sister who were walking to get candy on a frigid January evening in Bloomington this year.

But Donald E. Gayton Jr.'s family refused to accept the apology from Mikala Jean Ness, 28, who pleaded with a Hennepin County judge to give her probation for the fatal hit-and-run that snuffed out the life of the teen everyone called "Junior."

In the packed courtroom, Marsha Fugett's jaw trembled as if she was still standing at the crime scene in the grips of winter on Jan. 27, where she said Ness left her firstborn son on the side of the road "like a piece of trash."

"There was no call to help my son," Fugett said. "You killed my son and tried to take my daughter."

Gayton's sister, Tamya Lynn Gayton, then 14, survived the crash with serious injuries.

District Judge Julie Allyn said a probationary sentence would not reflect the loss of life and injuries caused to another. Allyn handed down a prison term of nearly three years.

Prosecutors charged Ness with two counts of criminal vehicular homicide — one for being under the influence of alcohol and the other for leaving the scene — and criminal vehicular operation, a gross misdemeanor. Ness pleaded guilty in July.

Assistant Hennepin County Attorney Kali Gardner, said video of the crash shows multiple vehicles slowing down to go around the siblings near E. 78th Street and 12th Avenue S. in Bloomington before Ness arrived.

"[Drivers] see them. They acknowledge them and make sure they stay safe," she said. "The defendant's vehicle doesn't slow down. It's traveling faster than the other vehicles."

Video captured the moment Ness struck "Junior," who is "thrown dozen of feet into the air."

The crash was shortly before 6 p.m. on a Friday. Ness was arrested by officers more than a mile away after her car went off the road in the 1900 block of Killebrew Drive, police said.

And while Ness said she cannot remember the crash, Gardner said everyone had to watch the tragic video. First responders had to see that crime scene. A nurse driving by stopped to render aid. All of them, Gardner said, will be affected by this for the rest of their lives.

All of it could have been prevented if Ness took an Uber home. Gardner said multiple colleagues tried to get Ness to not drive home that night.

"She had a choice," Gardner said.

Further, Fugett said that Ness should've learned from her mistakes since she was accused of hitting another pedestrian in 2017. Court records show Ness faced a personal injury lawsuit in Blue Earth County when she ran a stop sign and struck a pedestrian crossing Homestead Road in Mankato.

The lawsuit was dismissed three months before the fatal crash in Bloomington.

Ness' defense attorney Stephen Foertsch said Ness wanted to plead guilty and apologize to the victim's family at the beginning of the case, but he advised against it.

Foertsch told the judge that Ness has a 2-year-old daughter who would be traumatized from being separated from her mother — a comment that caused Fugett to start shaking and screaming.

He said that Ness has shown remorse and never once complained. And he said Ness doesn't remember the crash because she was diagnosed with PTSD.

"Her brain is telling her, 'We cannot let you remember this because you cannot handle it,'" he said. "She is already serving a life sentence."

He mentioned that Ness had only three drinks and they checked bar surveillance to see if she was drugged because her blood-alcohol content was 0.13% — "that's not enough for a blackout." Gardner corrected the defense attorney and said her BAC was actually 0.201%.

Ness, in reading from a lengthy statement in front of a dozen of her loved ones, said she wishes she could take it all back. She said she and her family pray for the victim's family every day and she said she has "so much undeserved support."

She knows she will be ashamed when she has to tell her daughter how two kids went to get candy "and one of them was not able to come home because of me," she said.

She is abstaining from alcohol and wants to be a cautionary tale for others to not drive drunk. She asked the judge to show her mercy because her actions that night are not a reflection of her true character.

Allyn said that while that may be true, she is worried about Ness not being in Alcoholics Anonymous or having a sponsor after she completed virtual treatment.

"No matter how remorseful you are, Donald Jr. is dead," Allyn said.

Gayton's mentor, James Austin, who works with the Bloomington nonprofit TreeHouse teen outreach program, said "Junior" was an active member of his program since the sixth grade. He said that he never got into trouble and took care of his community and family.

"Junior was an incredible kid. Legitimately," Austin said, taking a long pause, "one-of-a-kind. I got the privilege of going on many trips with him and got to see the type of man he was."

Once in Chicago, he said Gayton began picking up trash on the street.

"I said, 'Junior, you're not going to clean Chicago,'" Austin said.

"Every little bit helps," Gayton told him.

Gayton's family has since moved to Illinois because Fugett said this place is "too much for us." His sister Tamya, now 15, said she joined the junior ROTC in honor of her brother.

"I talked him into joining the Army and going to college. And we were going to do it together," said Tamya Gayton, in her uniform. "I decided to do it for him."