Woman who lost mother, daughter in crash caused by unlicensed driver fights for change

LAKE COUNTY, Fla. — The October 2016 death of a small girl and her grandmother is the driving force behind a state lawmaker's commitment to get repeat offenders off the road.

State Rep. Bob Cortes wants to write into Florida law harsher penalties for those who kill or injure others, and he also thinks there's a proactive way to boot them from the streets, too.

Ryan Painter's tragedy might soon inspire a change in Florida law that could save lives.

Read: Woman says man's careless decision ‘affected my life forever' after mom, daughter killed in crash

“Never in a million years did I think a state rep would go Tallahassee to fight for mom and Fallon,” Painter said. “It means the world to me.”

Painter lost her 56-year-old mother Debra Irwin and her 3-year-old daughter Fallon in a crash feet away from her driveway.

On Monday, Bob Cortes went to work in Tallahassee on her behalf to try to keep drivers like James Walker off the road.

Read: Family of crash victims calls for harsher penalties against unlicensed drivers

Troopers said his blood alcohol level was nearly three times over the legal limit. He also had a dozen traffic citations and a suspended license when he hit Painter’s mother and daughter head on.

“Obviously, this person should've never been driving,” Cortes said. “That was an accident that could've been avoided.”

Current law allows drivers to buy a car and insurance without showing a license and then use the insurance to register the car.

Read: 2 adults, toddler die in crash near Howey-in-the-Hills

Cortes wants to create new laws that require a license to buy insurance and force dealerships to run a driving history check before selling a vehicle.

“These are all the little things we can try to do to make our roads a little safer,” Cortes said. “This is what the process of legislation is all about.”

The driver who killed Painter's mother and daughter bought the Jaguar he was driving a week before the crash.

“It makes me sick that they were able to sell a car to someone with that many citations and a suspended license,” she said. “Because they might be alive if they would've said, ‘Hey, you can't buy this car today.’”

Cortes is working with the state on these new laws and plans to have legislation drafted by Friday.

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