JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – After the blood from a 25-year-old killed in a January 2017 hit-and-run was found on a SUV and phone records placed Sherri Ward at the scene that night, she was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of a crash that caused a death.
The Florida Highway Patrol said Jazmin Rodriguez was headed to her second job after 2 a.m. on Jan. 14, 2017, when she pulled over on Interstate 95 near the Old St. Augustine Road exit to check her tires. Troopers at the time said someone in an SUV hit her, throwing her over her car. That SUV kept going.
Rodriguez was taken to Orange Park Medical Center, where she died.
"It gives me some type of relief. But closure -- I won't have closure until I find out exactly what happened." Henry Rodriguez, Jazmin Rodriguez's father, said. "Why was it they couldn't even stop and help her? We are talking about hitting a person."
Before Jazmin Rodriguez died, she told her fiance over the phone she was hit by a silver Honda Pilot.
The arrest warrant said Ward took her SUV to a body shop two days later and told a friend and collision shop owner she had gotten "lost heading home and hit a guardrail."
The collision shop owner, having seen news reports about the hit-and-run, called police.
"When I woke up and saw the news, the vehicle I had in my possession here fit the description of the vehicle that was involved in the accident," said the shop owner, who wished to remain anonymous.
Investigators later found Rodriguez's blood on Ward's SUV.
Rodriguez left behind an 8-year-old son, who her family has been raising.
Ward was arrested April 23, 2018. She was released the same day on a $10,000 bond. She is due in court later this month.
In addition to criminal charges, Rodriguez's family is also suing Ward for wrongful death.