A Marathon County judge this week sentenced two drunken drivers who killed. Judge Greg Huber sentenced Danielle Zdeb of Wausau to 15 years in prison Wednesday for speeding away from sheriff's deputies and killing a Monroe man in December 2006.
"A message needs to be sent . . . that you do not drive drunk, you do not endanger people, that there is a consequence to doing so," said Huber, adding that Zdeb should have known better – because of her prior convictions. "You've been on notice, you've been picked up before for drunk driving," he told Zdeb, who had drunk previous driving arrests in Illinois and Indiana as well as in Wisconsin.
And on Thursday, Huber sentenced Todd Hahn of Merrill to five years in prison for a head on crash that killed a Wausau man. "I'm very sorry for the harm I've caused, and will be for the rest of my life," Hahn told members of the family of his victim, Blang Lao. "My brother's not here," said Lao's brother Chue Lao. "How could anything even be fair at all? The only thing that (is) fair to me is . . . if my brother's back."
Huber said his sentences will send a strong message that drinking and driving won't be tolerated. He says both defendants will also get the help they need.