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After killing man while driving drunk, former high school teacher pleads guilty to misdemeanor, fined $1,200

After pleading guilty to driving drunk the night she struck and killed a 90-year-old man in January, Diane O’Neill addressed the victim’s family, who sat in the audience of the courtroom.

“I know how profoundly difficult and painful it is to lose someone you love,” she read in an emotionally-charged prepared statement, speaking on the loss of her own husband. “I want to express my deepest sympathies to the Kurovics family for the loss of their husband, father and grandfather.”

O’Neill, a 65-year-old former Southold High School teacher, was driving on Main Road near Herricks Lane last January when she struck and killed George Kurovics of Jamesport. Kurovics had been in the roadway retrieving the body of his dead cat, who had been killed earlier by another vehicle.

O’Neill immediately called the police, according to the assistant district attorney in court today, but it was too late. Kurovics died January 13, the night of the accident, leaving behind his wife, four children, nine grandchildren at 14 great-grandchildren.

O’Neill had had two glasses of white wine before driving that evening, and when her blood was drawn after the accident, her blood alcohol content registered at .08 percent.

Though prosecutors were considering upgrading O’Neill’s charges, including a possible felony charge, the assistant district attorney at Riverhead Justice Court today announced that she is only being charged with a misdemeanor DWI.

“In the course of our investigation, we found no evidence to substantiate an upgrade from a misdemeanor DWI,” the prosecutor said.

Her swift reaction calling the police on the night of the accident, the fact that it was her first offense and the relatively low level of her blood alcohol content (.08 is the state’s cut-off for intoxication) were all factors, he said.

O’Neill will have pay a total of $1,200 in fines to the court, and she will have to drive with an interlock device, but she will not go to jail.

Kurovics’ family, who attended the sentencing today, were not satisfied with the sentence.

“Take your punishment,” said Joyce Kurovics, his wife, in a statement after O’Neill had finished reading her own. “It doesn’t equal the pain and suffering we’ve endured. He lost his life. You still have yours.”

After she left the court with her family, she called the punishment “lenient.”

“When there’s a fatality, death is something you can never return from,” she said. “It’s final.”

Her son, George, called for reform in the legal system.

“They did everything they could under the law, but we wish more would have happened,” he said. “We wish more would have been done.”

“We miss him every day,” added Linda Shropshire, the victim’s daughter. “We think about him every day. He was such a great guy who touched the lives of so many people.”

George Kurovics was the owner and operator of George’s Rocky Point Barber Shop, which he founded in 1948. He also served in World War II in the U.S. Navy.

O’Neill, who lives in Farmingville, was a Southold High School math teacher for 21 years until she retired shortly after the accident.

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Katie Blasl
Katie, winner of the 2016 James Murphy Cub Reporter of the Year award from the L.I. Press Club, is a reporter, editor and web developer for the LOCAL news websites. A Riverhead native, she is a 2014 graduate of Stony Brook University. Email Katie