Two sentenced in unrelated vehicular homicide cases

Two people have been sentenced in Franklin County Common Pleas Court to prison time for killing somebody with a vehicle in separate, unrelated incidents, one involving a hit-skip and the other a wrong-way, head-on crash.

Anthony D. Lee, 38, will spend 6 years in prison for the 2021 hit-skip death of 26-year-old Kaine Ratcliff, of Reynoldsburg, following sentencing Wednesday by Common Pleas Judge Andria Noble. Lee’s driver’s license was also suspended for life.

Lee, whose last known address was the streets of Columbus, pleaded guilty on Aug. 31 to one count of vehicular homicide and one count of failure to stop after an accident. He entered an Alford plea, meaning he maintains his innocence, but acknowledges the evidence against him would likely mean a conviction at trial and a longer sentence than he will get with the plea deal.

Just before 2 p.m. on Sept. 12, 2021, Ratcliff was struck by a van while standing in an alley located off 2600 Beulah Road in North Linden, according to court records.

Witnesses observed a heavily damaged white 2007 GMC van leaving the area around the time Ratcliff’s body was discovered, according to court records. Officers found the abandoned van at a nearby Shell gas station.

According to a sentencing memo written by Lee’s defense attorney, Franklin

County Assistant Public Defender Rachel Craig, a woman told authorities in February that she, Ratcliff and Lee were together committing crimes the night before Ratcliff was struck.

The woman said they were inside a white work van that Ratcliff had recently stolen, according to the memo. The two men were smoking crack, she said, and Lee became paranoid and erratic.

Man sentenced for deadly wrong-way crash

Eric C. Hunter, 25, will spend at least four years in prison for killing 30-yearold Allegra Zambarrano, of the South Side, in a wrong-way crash on State Route 315 in 2020.

Franklin County Common Pleas

Judge Carl Aveni sentenced Hunter, of Gambier in Knox County, on Oct. 5 to an indefinite prison term of four years to six years. Aveni suspended Hunter’s driver’s license for life.

Hunter pleaded guilty in August to aggravated vehicular homicide. In exchange, county prosecutors dismissed charges of operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated.

Around 11:30 p.m. on Dec. 19, 2020, Zambarro was driving south on Route 315 when Hunter, driving the wrong way, struck her vehicle head-on near the Interstate 670 interchange, Downtown.

Both drivers were taken to Ohiohealth Grant Medical Center, where Zambarrano died the next day. jlaird@dispatch.com @Lairdwrites