A West Palm Beach man has died after succumbing to injuries from a Wednesday car crash that also killed his wife and 10-year-old child and injured a toddler, the Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office confirmed Sunday afternoon.
The sheriff’s office said Alejandro G. Rodriguez, 46, was pronounced dead at Delray Medical Center Hospice around 4:45 p.m. Friday, and that family members had been notified.
Arsenio Almaguer, his brother-in-law, wrote in a GoFundMe fundraiser he created to cover the family’s funeral expenses that Rodriguez had been “brain-dead” and “only breathing connected to a machine” since the crash.
A memorial service for Rodriguez’s wife, Grechy Y. Almaguer-Perez, is planned for Monday in Lantana, according to an online memorial site. Attempts to reach Almaguer on social media went unanswered Sunday afternoon.
Rodriguez is survived by his 2-year-old son, Fabio, who is hospitalized at Delray Beach Medical Center with a broken right tibia, according to WPEC-Ch. 12.
Fabio “is struggling for his life, which will never be the same without his parents,” Almaguer added on his fundraising page.
Dawn Michele Howard, 54, of Lake Worth Beach, was traveling north in a 2020 Lexus on South Military Trail in unincorporated Palm Beach County around 8 p.m. Wednesday when the traffic light turned yellow, and she sped up to drive through the intersection before it turned red, officers said.
When Howard “entered a sweeping left hand curve,” the vehicle crashed into the back of Rodriguez’s 2010 Volkswagen Jetta, which was traveling in the same direction and was carrying four people. The collision instantly killed Almaguer-Perez, 43, while their 10-year-old son, Diego, was pronounced dead at Delray Medical Center, according to the crash report.
Howard’s Lexus then drifted onto the eastern shoulder of the road, where it rolled over, and she was later admitted to Delray Medical Center with minor injuries, the Sheriff’s Office added. The crash report said Howard was suspected of driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
While hospitalized, Howard became enraged when a deputy, who’d been assigned to watch her as a suspect in the crash, told her she couldn’t use the bathroom unsupervised. Howard allegedly slapped the deputy’s wrist and the deputy handcuffed Howard to the hospital bed, a probable cause affidavit said.
Charges stemming from the crash are still pending, the Sheriff’s office confirmed Sunday afternoon. Howard faces one count of battery on a law enforcement officer stemming from the hospital incident, court records show.
“To my knowledge, [the battery on a police officer] is the only charge [Howard] faces,” Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Teri Barbera said. “The triple fatal is still ongoing and active. We’re still in the very beginning stages of this investigation.”
Palm Beach County jail released Howard Thursday afternoon without needing to post bail, court and jail records show.
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