A woman from South River was sentenced on Oct. 2 to serve six years in a New Jersey state prison for causing the death of a 49-year-old man from North Brunswick while driving while intoxicated.
Phyllis Kocheran, 52, must serve 85 percent of her prison term before becoming eligible for parole. The sentence was imposed in New Brunswick by Superior Court Judge Michael A. Toto, who also suspended Kocheran’s license for five years after she is released from prison, according to information provided by Middlesex County Prosecutor Andrew C. Carey.
Kocheran was sentenced after she pleaded guilty on Aug. 7 in accordance with a plea agreement reached with Middlesex County Assistant Prosecutor Keith Abrams to one count of second degree vehicular homicide and driving while intoxicated for striking and causing the death of William Oross. In pleading guilty, she admitted she was intoxicated when she was driving her 2011 Jeep Wrangler on Pulawski Avenue in South River around 11:17 a.m. May 3, and then struck the victim who was working for a private recycling company at the time.
Oross was taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where he was pronounced dead from the blunt force injuries he sustained from being hit by Kocheran’s Jeep, according to the statement.
Kocheran was charged following an investigation by Detective Joseph Guiamano of the South River Police Department and Detective Mark Morris of the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office.