ASSOCIATED PRESS
Repeat DUI offender Michael Krivak, 40, sat in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas yesterday before being sentenced to 14 years in prison for killing bicyclist Chris Holt, 44, and injuring Holt's 8-year-old son, Chance, in an April drunken driving accident.
Drunken driver gets
14 years in hit-run deathThe parolee killed former isle
resident Chris Holt in Las Vegas
LAS VEGAS >> A Nevada judge sent a New Mexico parolee to prison for 14 years yesterday, heeding a little boy's plea for a long sentence for the drunken driver who killed his father as they rode bicycles together in Las Vegas.
"Dear Judge. I want to tell you my dad was the best dad a boy could have," read a note from 9-year-old Chance Holt, who was hurt in the crash that killed his father, Chris Holt, a former Hawaii resident. "Please put that bad man in jail for a very, very long time."
Authorities credited the 44-year-old father with getting his son out of the way before being hit by Michael Krivak's pickup truck, which went on to crash repeatedly during a 10-mile rampage through residential neighborhoods on April 15.
Witnesses told police that Krivak drove for more than a mile with Holt embedded in his truck's windshield before stopping, pulling the body off the hood and driving away. Krivak, 40, was arrested when his smoking, wrecked pickup broke down after the series of crashes.
He pleaded guilty July 31 to driving under the influence causing death and to two charges of leaving the scene of an accident. He apologized to Holt's family yesterday.
"I truly am sorry, for what it's worth," he said, adding that he was in an alcohol-induced blackout and could not remember the fatal afternoon drive home from a bar.
Melanie Holt, the dead man's sister, and Greg Pa, his stepbrother, said Holt's death devastated his large family in Hilo and in Las Vegas.
"We need Mr. Krivak to stay in jail," Melanie Holt said, "so he cannot go out in this community again and drink and drive."
Clark County District Judge Joseph Bonaventure said he had little sympathy for Krivak, whose blood-alcohol content was measured at nearly 0.34 percent a few hours after his arrest.
The legal blood-alcohol limit in Nevada, 0.10 percent, becomes 0.08 percent Tuesday.
"How do you drive like that?" Bonaventure asked Krivak. "How can you even stand up?"
The judge credited Krivak with pleading guilty and sparing the Holt family a trial. But he sentenced him to 14 to 35 years after citing his history of felony convictions for burglary and grand larceny in Clifton, N.J., and three drunken driving convictions in New Mexico.
The judge noted that Krivak also completed a 28-day alcohol treatment program in New Mexico before moving to Las Vegas in January without informing his parole officer.
Chris Holt was a cousin of former Hawaii state Sen. Milton Holt and hula teacher Vicky Holt Takamine.
