Restaurant owner recalls 'letting go' as street-racing crash hit her on the sidewalk

PROVIDENCE – Natacha Legein stopped at Edgewood Liquor to buy Belgian beer around 8:30 p.m., Sept. 21, 2020, to celebrate the opening of her new restaurant, Crepe Corner, the next day. But the evening’s plans were brutally marred minutes later as a pickup truck rolled over and plowed into her as she walked to her car.

The pickup truck was one of two vehicles that lost control as they raced south on Broad Street at speeds estimated at 62 mph in a 25-mph zone. Both tried to stop to avoid another car. Heavy landscaping equipment spilled onto Legein from the truck bed as it rolled.

The Crepe Corner’s opening at 2170 Broad St., in the heart of Pawtuxet Village, would be indefinitely delayed as Legein was hospitalized with devastating injuries, including a cracked vertebrae, bruised lungs, severe brain swelling and a fractured eye socket.

“What happened when I came out of the store I don’t remember. What I do remember was letting go,” Legein said in court Monday.

What brought her back, she said, were the sounds of her children’s voices, ages 2, 4 and 10 at the time.

Legein told of reverting to her native French and being unable to communicate with her husband, Anthony Adagboyi. In the aftermath, Adagboyi had to quit his job to run two restaurants, attend to the children and care for her as she labored over basic daily tasks such as bathing.

“I basically was like a child,” Legein said. The only reason the crash didn’t end in death was because of who she is, a mother with something to live for, she said.

On Tuesday, the two men responsible for Legein’s grievous injuries – Jacob Gardner, 21, and George Rodriguez, 33 – were sentenced for their crimes, with lawyers on either side of the case making vastly different recommendations.

While the men’s defense lawyers asked for home confinement, Assistant Attorney General J. Patrick Youngs III implored the court to impose three years of jail time.

“It’s a decision they both made. Horrific, yes; accident, no. This was a crime … This was a violent crime,” Youngs said, emphasizing Legein’s blinding headaches, continual pain and struggles with memory. She underwent surgery on her leg just 10 weeks ago and has to type everything into her phone to remember it.

Superior Court Judge Richard D. Raspallo called the case one of the hardest he’s experienced, noting that it had traumatized all the families involved.

“Both of you used your cars as weapons,” Raspallo said.

He faulted Gardner for weeks earlier being ticketed by state police going 81 mph in a 50-mph zone.

“I think part of it, Mr. Gardner, is that you suffer from youth,” Raspallo said.

He chided Rodriguez, a father of three, for being arrested recently for disorderly conduct and resisting. Court records indicate the charges were later dismissed.

“You haven’t learned a thing,” he said.

He chalked their crimes up to ego.

“I don’t know where you were going that day, why you were in so much of a rush,” the judge said. He said both men, who pleaded no contest, exhibited a resistance to rules.

“This was not just an accident … It was careless and it was reckless and it was without a thought for anyone,” Raspallo said.

Raspallo sentenced Gardner, of Warwick, to five years suspended with probation for driving to endanger, resulting in physical injury, and a two-year loss of license. He received one year of home confinement for reckless driving, first offense. He was represented by John E. MacDonald.

Rodriguez, of Providence, received five years in prison, with one to serve, for driving to endanger, resulting in physical injury, plus a two-year loss of license. In addition, Raspallo sentenced Rodriguez to a consecutive one-year suspended sentence with probation, plus a one-year loss of license for reckless driving.

Rodriguez, who was represented by Rory Munns, received two years of home confinement, also to be served consecutively, for a second count of driving to endanger, resulting in physical injury.

Both men expressed remorse for Legein’s injuries and her family’s suffering.

According to authorities, Gardner and Rodriguez were traveling south on Broad Street at a high speed, with Gardner driving north in the southbound lane the night of the crash.  They lost control as a car turned left onto Berwick Avenue in Cranston, with Rodriguez’s BMW striking the car and Gardner’s truck rolling twice and hitting Legein as she walked.

Legein was born in Belgium Congo and raised in Belgium before moving to the United State at age 19 to live with an aunt. She worked three jobs to send money to her mother, who now works with Legein.

Eventually, Legein moved to Rhode Island and met Adagboyi, a Nigerian by birth, while both were working third shift at Citizens Bank. They have three children, aged 2 to 10, two are on the autism spectrum.

On Monday, Legein said her youngest child continues to be gripped with fear everytime she leaves the house, fearing her mother won’t return. Her little one has just begun to sleep without her.

“I came back to because of my family,” Legein said.

Brian Hodge, spokesman for Attorney General Peter F. Neronha, said Neronha plans to push the General Assembly session for stiffer sentencing terms for driving to endanger, resulting in injury.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Men sentenced in crash that nearly killed Crepe Corner owner