By Scott Sullivan
Editor
A Douglas man who pleaded no contest to a June 20 hit-and-run that killed an 88-year-old woman was sentenced last week to one year in jail and three years of probation for failure to stop at the scene of an accident resulting in serious impairment.
Ryan Cubbage, 35, will also have to perform 400 hours of community service and pay $110,259.02 in restitution.
Victim Jean Beaty was walking along 117th Avenue west of 56th Street in Clyde Township, south of Fennville, June 13, 2020, when she was hit by a car. She died nine days later.
Cubbage was first thought to be a good Samaritan when he took a badly-injured Beaty to her home in his pickup truck that day. He told them he found her along the rural roadside and she asked to be brought home.
After a months-long investigation, including matching tire marks and a transfer mark on Beaty’s clothing that matched Cubbage’s tire brand, he was arrested in March last year.
Investigators found Cubbage struck Beaty with the rear panel of the pickup after drifting off the road, then correcting at the last minute.
She was conscious after the crash but became progressively worse after her family drove her to Holland Hospital, where she died June 22, 2020.
In January Cubbage pleaded no contest to the first charge and the latter two were dismissed. A no-contest plea does not admit guilt but is treated the same as any other conviction at sentencing.
