In March 2022, WWE Hall of Fame inductee Tammy Sytch, aka Sunny, was arrested on charges related to driving under the influence and manslaughter. Volusia County, Florida, police say that Sytch was driving drunk at a high rate of speed just before she hit Julian L. Lasseter, who was stopped at a traffic light. Lasseter, a grandfather, crashed into the vehicle in front of him and was killed instantly. Four individuals in the third car were reportedly treated for minor injuries at the scene.
At her sentencing hearing today, which was live-streamed online, Sytch apologized to the Lasseter family for what she described as a “stupid decision.” Sytch’s defense argued for her only to receive probation, but when the time came, that was not the judgment Circuit Court Judge Karen A. Foxman passed down.
Sytch was sentenced to just over ten and a half years on the charges of driving with a suspended driver’s license and causing bodily death or harm. She was given a credit of 566 days for the time she already spent in prison. She received another seven-and-a-half-year sentence, to be served consecutively, on her DUI second-degree felony charge. An additional 364-day sentence was also passed down, which will be served concurrently on misdemeanor charges. After serving her time in prison, she will also be under an eight-year probation.
In total, Sytch will see around eighteen years in prison and will be released sometime in 2041 if she has to serve the entirety of her sentence. If that is the case, she will be 68 years old at the time of her release.
Sytch’s time in pro wrestling did come up during the sentencing hearing. Her defense brought a forensic psychologist and neurological psychologist to speak about how PTSD and concussions from her time in pro wrestling and other life events had affected her memory, reasoning, and impulse control. Her family’s history of alcohol addiction was also brought up.