Drunk driver sentenced for Highway 50 fatal accident

A trip to South Lake Tahoe for the 4th of July fireworks turned deadly in 2014 for a couple from Dixon, CA when the motorcycle they were riding was struck by a drunk driver in the Twin Bridges area.

Megan Hickel, 28, was sentenced on Monday to 12 years in state prison for killing the couple, 48-year-old Richard Schwab and his wife Kelly, age 49.

El Dorado County Superior Court Presiding Judge Suzanne Kingsbury handed down the sentence after Hickel pled guilty to two counts gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated.

On the evening of July 4th 2014, after viewing a Fourth of July fireworks display in South Lake Tahoe, Richard Schwab and his wife Kelly Schwab were returning home to Dixon on Highway 50 when their motorcycle was struck in a cross-over collision by Hickel’s vehicle going in the opposite direction in the Twin Bridges area. The Schwabs were killed instantly.

Deputy District Attorney Michael P. Pizzuti, who prosecuted the case, said the confinement time was the maximum allowed by law because Hickel had no prior criminal record. Pizzuti is assigned to vertically prosecute felony driving under the influence cases and vehicular manslaughter cases for the El Dorado County District Attorney’s Office under a traffic safety grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety.