Wrong-way DUI driver who killed 23-year-old paramedic on Turnpike gets 20 years

A wrong-way driver under the influence of multiple substances will spend the next 20 years behind bars after crashing head-on into a car driven by a 23-year-old paramedic, killing him on Florida’s Turnpike in Broward County.

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Sunshine “Shine” Perez, 46, dressed in a blue jumpsuit and shackled to a wheelchair, addressed Judge Peter Holden and the family of Ezequiel “Zeke” Urrutia on Friday, speaking the longest out of anyone, including the more than 20 of Zeke’s loved ones who spoke ahead of Perez’s sentencing. Perez plead guilty in March, avoiding a trial.

A crying Perez started by expressing her condolences and apologies to Urrutia’s family, continually saying that she can’t imagine what his mother is going through — especially as a mother of two herself. She insisted the crash was an accident.

Though, Zeke’s family called Perez’s statements “nothing but excuses” after her sentencing.

“Sunshine Perez killed my son,” Zeke’s mother, Tiffany Urrutia, said during Friday’s sentencing.

Perez spent much of her speaking time telling Judge Holden that if she is given a chance she hopes to do good acts, including teaching others not to drink and drive, something that she says she already tells the women she is jailed with.

“I want to be able to come back from this,” she said.

But, as Zeke’s friends and family took the podium, they asked Judge Holden for the maximum penalty.

“Zeke Uruttia did not die, Sunshine Renae Perez killed him,” said Eleasa Brown Thompson, a family friend of the Urrutias, said.

Brown Thompson, a retired major with the then-Miami-Dade Police Department, called Perez a “detriment to society,” adding that her family and friends have continued to make excuses for her actions.

“They want her to get one more do-over,” Brown Thompson said. “Zeke Uruttia does not get a do-over.”

While, Perez did not receive the maximum sentence of 34 years on Friday, Zeke’s relatives said they feel at peace with the sentence.

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In a letter to the court, her husband, Phillip Perez, described his wife’s traumatic childhood, including the death of her mother when she was 7. A former certified nursing assistant who lives in Hialeah, her most recent job was to assemble computer and TV displays. Phillip Perez said the crash and Urrutia’s resulting death so saddened him, he considered divorce. He stuck a photo of Urrutia inside his Bible.

“I trully (sic) believe there is 2 ways her life will go,” his handwritten letter to the judge says. “One is to recovery with A-A & church or back to her old ways. I would now like to wait for her and see her walk in a Christian life with me. Or that’s it, I’m finished with her.”

Phillip Perez spoke in court on Friday, expressing how sorry he is and said he will wait for his wife to come back home.

Perez told police she didn’t remember what happened that night. Detectives obtained surveillance video showing her purchasing a bottle of Patron tequila at BM Liquors off Pembroke Road in western Hollywood at 8:50 p.m. that night, then visiting 23 Liquor Store off Hallandale Beach Boulevard just before midnight to buy another.

Two hours later, at 1:50 in the morning on a Thursday — Jan. 9, 2025 — she entered the off-ramp at Northwest 27th Avenue/University Drive and drove the wrong way onto the Turnpike.

Zeke Urrutia was a paramedic for MCT Express and a state-certified firefighter who was applying for jobs in South Florida. He was driving a 2016 Honda Civic on the northbound side of the Turnpike — though on that span of the roadway, along the Miami-Dade/Broward line, the highway’s directions are east and west. A non-drinker, he was driving up from the Miami area, headed to the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino near Hollywood, his dad said.

He was driving in the inside lane with his seatbelt on. Perez, in a 2010 Honda Element SUV, was in the same lane, driving toward him for two miles. She never swerved, investigators said. They collided head-on not far from the Red Road exit in Miramar.

Urrutia couldn’t be revived; he was declared dead 10 minutes later, court records say. Perez, who smelled of liquor and had “bloodshot red watery eyes,” was taken to the hospital, where she told investigators that she had been at a friend’s house in Miami Gardens and didn’t remember anything after, including how she got on the Turnpike, court records recount.

Her blood tested positive for alcohol, methamphetamine and oxycodone.

This was her fifth crash in 29 years, court records say. In two of the other crashes, she was speeding, in one she was driving carelessly, the other she ran a stop sign.

Perez was sentenced to 15 years for vehicular homicide and five years for DUI manslaughter followed by 10 years of probation in which she will not be allowed to drive and is subject to weekly drug tests.

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This story will be updated.