PORT ANGELES — An apologetic Amber D. Steim has been sentenced to six years in state prison for causing the highway death of a Crescent Beach nurse more than 18 months ago.
“I want to say I deeply apologize for my actions, and I take full responsibility,” Steim said during Monday’s session in Clallam County Superior Court.
The 25-year-old Port Angeles woman pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide for driving close to three times over the legal limit for alcohol when she crossed the centerline on state Highway 112 and killed 44-year-old Ellen Joan DeBondt in a nearly head-on wreck east of Joyce the morning of March 6, 2011.
The State Patrol said Steim had a 0.23-percent blood-alcohol level about an hour after the 7:54 a.m. wreck.
The legal limit in Washington is 0.08 percent.
The 72-month sentence includes eight months for witness tampering, to which Steim entered an Alford plea.
An Alford plea means that Steim maintains her innocence but admits there is enough evidence for a conviction.
The witness-tampering charge stems from a jailhouse phone call in which Steim allegedly urged a friend to tell her attorney that she drank alcohol after the wreck because she was in pain.
A charge of reckless endangerment — and the aggravating circumstances to vehicular homicide — were dropped in exchange for a guilty plea.
The six-year sentence will be reduced for the 10 months that Steim has already spent in the Clallam County jail.
It will not be lowered, however, for the eight months that Steim was out on bail wearing an alcohol-detection bracelet that detected a 0.058 percent blood-alcohol level Oct. 30 and resulted in a return to jail.
Steim will eligible for a reduced sentence for good behavior at the Washington Corrections Center for Women in Purdy.
Steim sobbed as she addressed about three dozen of DeBondt’s friends and family members near the end of Monday’s two-hour sentencing hearing before Superior Court Judge Kenneth D. Williams.
“I was an alcoholic, and I have an addiction,” she said.
“And now I took a special person away from this world. I am very sorry for all the pain I have caused the family and friends of Ellen DeBondt.”
Steim’s statement followed 80 minutes of emotional testimony from DeBondt’s family and friends.
Family members who couldn’t make the trip from Hawaii had their victim-impact statements read aloud by DeBondt’s close friends.
Ken DeBondt, Ellen DeBondt’s husband, was the first to speak.
“Not a day goes by when I don’t shed some tears,” he said.
“I think about her every day. I am sure I will continue to do so for as long as I live.”
The DeBondts moved from Seattle to a home above their favorite surf spot at Crescent Beach in June 2009, where the couple “shared a deep love for being active and outdoors.”
“She had so much promise and joy in her future, and so much to give,” Ken DeBondt said.
“We are all losing out. Not just her friends and family, but the entire community.”
Ellen DeBondt was described as a compassionate home health nurse who inspired others with her positive attitude and a radiant smile.
Gabriele Finn said her sister “died a violent, horrible and tragic death, and we must remember that.”
The crash investigation found that DeBondt had time to pull over to the right, or eastbound, shoulder near Oxenford Road in the moments before impact.
“There was absolutely nothing that she could do,” Finn said.
“Everything was in Steim’s hands. She was so absurdly drunk [that] she plowed into Ellen and took her last breath away.
“Steim destroyed Ellen’s life, and took ours with her that Sunday morning.”
Clallam County Prosecuting Attorney Deb Kelly added a first-degree murder charge earlier this year. That charge was dismissed.
Several speakers recalled the ghastly cries of Ellen DeBondt’s mother, Maria Wilson, when she received news of her daughter’s death in a phone call from her grief-stricken son-in-law.
“She was the absolutely perfect sister and wife, daughter, godmother and friend that anyone could hope for,” Finn said.
“She had a heart of gold.”
A new state law that stiffened the penalties for vehicular homicides was not retroactive to Steim’s case, Judge Williams said.
“In this case, under the facts as they are at present, my choice is to sentence Ms. Steim to either five years or six years in prison,” he said.
“Had this accident occurred this year, that range would be much higher.”
In sentencing Steim to the high end, Williams cited her orders to not drink alcohol and stay out of bars after a January 2011 conviction of first-degree negligent driving.
“On the evening before this event, she did both,” Williams said.
Defense attorney Ralph Anderson defended his client against claims some have made that Steim lacked remorse.
“Amber Steim has never complained, never pointed a finger at anybody else and tried to maintain as good a demeanor as she could given the seriousness of what’s about to occur,” Anderson said.
“She’s going to prison for six years. Even with some time served, it’s no pardon.”
In prison, Steim will “get an education, she will get treatment, she will get the things she needs to come out a better person.”
“I see every opportunity for rehabilitation,” Anderson said.
“And in our society, rehabilitation is important.”
Williams said no sentence could lessen the pain to DeBondt’s family and the loss to the community.
“No person — and I have said this time and again — is more dangerous than people who get behind the wheel of a car while impaired,” Williams said.
“That is the person who is more likely than not to kill a family member needlessly, without any justification and without any intent whatsoever.”
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5072, or at rollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
