A Chicago woman was sentenced to 11 years in prison Thursday after pleading guilty to drunk driving charges in a crash that killed a man and a woman who had stopped to change a flat tire on the Eisenhower Expressway.
Ashanti Gates, 23, pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated DUI causing death in connection with the June 2024 crash that killed Erik Cox and Shealyn Sherwood, both 18. Under a plea deal reached with Judge Pamela Stratigakis, Gates must serve 85% of her sentence.
Gates was driving 77 miles per hour without her headlights on when she slammed into Cox and Sherwood’s stalled car near Damen Avenue, prosecutors alleged. The pair had pulled onto the right shoulder to fix a flat tire when the impact sent their vehicle into them. A third person in the car was not hurt, officials said.
Prosecutors said Gates had been drinking Tito’s vodka before getting behind the wheel of her Hyundai Sonata. Her blood alcohol concentration was measured at .186 shortly after the crash, more than twice the legal limit.
Sherwood’s family remembered her in a GoFundMe campaign as “an absolutely amazing artist, with one of the most creative, unique, funny, and indescribably spectacular minds.”
“The impact she had on so many is unfathomably huge, spreading nothing but love, laughs, and beauty with every footstep she blessed this world with,” the family wrote in a GoFundMe campaign.
“She made the most of every second she had, and lived more of a fulfilling and fun life than some do in 70 years,” they continued.
In a separate campaign, Cox’s friends described him as “full of life and had everything going for him.” He had graduated from Rolling Meadows High School just 2 weeks before the crash and was preparing to attend Columbia College in the fall to study graphic design, his friends said.
“His friend group was larger than anyone I know,” the campaign author wrote. “Everyone loved Erik.”
