Family of woman killed in hit-and-run says suspect should be charged with murder

INDIANAPOLIS — On Tuesday, the Marion County Prosecutor charged 40-year-old Randy Thornton for his alleged role in a deadly hit-and-run on the east of Indianapolis.

Detectives said Thornton hit a go-kart on May 27 and killed 31-year-old Ambra Alcozer as she was riding with her boyfriend down 16th Street near Fenton Avenue.

“I still struggle today,” Shawn Alcozer, Ambra’s mother, said. “When you called me today, that made my day. We’ve been waiting to hear that.”

Police said Thornton kept driving and left Alcozer dead on the side of the road.

“It’s taken a whole lot of all of our hearts because she was that big of a prominent factor in our family and we no longer have that,” Shawn said.

According to court documents, Thornton was a well-known nuisance in the area and had been stalking his ex-wife who lives near where the crash happened. Neighbors told police he would repeatedly drive by her home.

Detectives believe that’s what he was doing that night. Text messages left on Ambra’s phone show she texted a friend to call the police on him just a few minutes before she was killed.

“Text 1 and Text 2 were sent at 9:56 pm, ‘Call police on Tahoe,’ and ‘He back on bs,'” investigators wrote in charging documents. “Text 3 was sent at 9:57 pm, ‘All down 16.'”

The first officer arrived on the scene just a few minutes later.

Neighbors told police that same night that the suspect vehicle was the SUV that Thornton often drove and cops found the vehicle stashed behind a home a few days later.

“I was just thinking, ‘Finally, finally he’s been charged,'” Shawn said. “Like we’ve known this whole time who it was. We gave his name to the police and it took them this long to do it.”

In court filings, detectives said they were able to match debris at the scene to Thornton’s SUV and the final confirmation came in August when cell phone records came back showing he was in the area the night of the crash.

Shawn said she thinks Thornton should be facing a murder charge, but for now, she’ll take what she can get.

“I would just ask [him] why. Why was it okay for you to hit that Go-kart and take my daughter’s life? It’s not okay and I just want to know why,” Shawn said.

She said her focus now is honoring her daughter’s life and ensuring that she gets the justice that she deserves.

“If you can take a life and still go on about your day like nothing even happened, you don’t deserve to walk this earth,” Shawn said.

Thornton is already being held in the Marion County Jail without bond from a previous case where he allegedly ran from police in a U-Haul truck he had rented.

In this most recent case, no future court dates have been scheduled.

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