Man sentenced to prison for drunk driving crash that killed NYU student

A man who ran over a 21-year-old NYU student while driving drunk last spring was sentenced to one to three years in prison in a Manhattan courtroom Tuesday.

Michael DeGuzman, 51, was driving on East Houston Street in May 2022 when he hit Raife Milligan, killing him. Prosecutors said DeGuzman ’s blood alcohol content was .13% when police stopped him. Drivers are considered to be impaired when their blood alcohol level reaches .05% and intoxicated at .08% in New York.

DeGuzman pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter and vehicular manslaughter earlier this year.

Milligan grew up in Jasper, Ind. and moved to New York City to study biochemistry at NYU, according to an online memorial. He hoped to become a doctor.

In a victim impact statement submitted to the judge, Milligan’s older brother, Reid Milligan, described him as an “artistic, witty, brilliant, bubbly goofball.” His twin, Reece Milligan, wrote that he felt “empty, depressed and confused.” He said he can’t cross a street without thinking about his brother — that his stomach sinks whenever he sees the type of car DeGuzman was driving when he struck Milligan.

“Mr. DeGuzman ruined my life,” Reece wrote. “There is no coming back from this. There is only tolerating it.”

DeGuzman apologized to Milligan’s family in court.

At first, he spoke so quietly that the judge had to ask him to raise his voice. Then, he said that getting behind the wheel that night was “the biggest mistake of my life” and that he knew better. He said he thinks about it every day.

“From the bottom of my heart, I am so, so sorry,” he told Milligan’s parents, adding that he would not let a single day go by without honoring his victim.

“I never meant to hurt your boy,” DeGuzman said.

Milligan’s mother, Liz Milligan, described the pain she felt knowing she would never be able to touch her son again.

“Raife was certainly a legend in his own time,” she said. “And legends never die.”

Before court officers led DeGuzman out of the courtroom, Judge Laura Ward read the terms of the sentence and said she hoped he would spend his time in prison thinking about the families he had destroyed — both Milligan’s and his own.