A bench warrant was issued Monday for the arrest of a Santa Paula woman who failed to appear in court on charges of vehicular manslaughter in last year’s traffic death of emergency medical technician Christopher Ronald Parry.
Yolanda Muñoz Hernandez, who was 50 years old at the time of the crash, was scheduled to appear Monday at the Santa Clarita Courthouse on a misdemeanor count of vehicular manslaughter and an infraction for unsafe speed, Ricardo Santiago, spokesman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office told The Signal Monday.
Hernandez, however, failed to appear in court, according to a bailiff in Courtroom #1 of the Santa Clarita Courthouse.
“A bench warrant is issued when a defendant does not appear on a scheduled court date,” Santiago said. “ I see that on this case a bench warrant was issued.”
Hernandez was scheduled to be arraigned on the misdemeanor charge and the infraction.
Parry, a 35-year-old EMT with American Medical Response Inc., was killed in a traffic collision on Aug. 24, 2016, while he was on his way to work.
A married father of two young children, Parry lived in Ojai and worked in the Santa Clarita Valley.
The fatal crash happened shortly before 5:45 a.m. on Highway 126, just east of the Ventura County line, California Highway Patrol Officer Josh Greengard said at the time of the crash.
The motorcyclist was operating a 2008 Shang Motorcycle scooter, traveling eastbound on Highway 126 in the “number 2 lane” which is the lane next to the fast lane, at an unknown speed, he said at that time.
A driver of a 2006 Dodge Stratus traveling eastbound on the same roadway in the same line directly behind the motorcyclist, he said.
The driver of the Dodge was “traveling at a greater speed than (the motorcyclist),” Greengard said, who “failed to notice” the motorcyclist directly in front of her.
The Dodge rear-ended the motorcycle causing the motorcyclist to be ejected off the scooter and over the Dodge, Greengard said in August.
The driver of the Dodge was identified by CHP officers at the time of the crash as 50-year-old Yolanda Hernandez, of Santa Paula.
661-287-5527
on Twitter @jamesarthurholt
