Pablo Lyle, Telenovela Star, Gets 5 Years for Road-Rage Death: “It Haunts Me”
After a road-rage incident in Miami that killed one man, Pablo Lyle was sentenced to five years in prison.
NBC Miami says that Lyle, who is 36, wore a jail jumpsuit to court on Friday to get his sentence.
A jury found the actor guilty on Oct. 4 after he was arrested for a 2019 incident in which Lyle punched a man during a fight about traffic. Juan Ricardo Hernández, who was 63 years old, was knocked down. Video surveillance caught the whole thing on film.
His family says that the fall gave Hernández a brain injury that led to an internal bleeding that knocked him out. Hernández’s life-support systems were eventually turned off.
Phil Reizenstein, Lyle’s lawyer, said, “The conviction is unfair, and we hope it will be overturned on appeal, but the sentence was fair.”
Lyle was found guilty of manslaughter and could have gotten between 9.25 and 15 years in prison. However, NBC Miami says that Judge Marisa Tinkler Mendez was kind to Lyle after seeing how sorry he was.
“No one here will be happy, and no one here will forget the pain that’s been caused,” Tinkler Mendez was quoted as saying by the outlet.
Lyle will also have to take anger management classes, do 500 hours of community service, and be on probation for 8 years, according to reports.
During the hearing, Hernández’s family spoke out.
Juan Ricardo Hernández Jr. said that his father, Hernández, was “a happy person.”
He said, “There are no words to describe what a beautiful person my father was.”
Lyle told the judge during the hearing that he did not mean to kill Hernández.
He told WPLG, the ABC station in Miami, “I really thought I was protecting my family.”
During the sentencing hearing, Lyle said sorry to Hernández’s family.