Rebecca Grossman gets 15 years for murder of boys killed in crosswalk

A choose on Monday sentenced Rebecca Grossman to fifteen years to life in jail for the murders of two brothers she struck whereas rushing by means of a Westlake Village crosswalk 4 years in the past, saying her actions have been “reckless and unquestionably negligent.”

After listening to Nancy Iskander, the mom of 11-year-old Mark Iskander and 8-year-old Jacob Iskander, angrily ask for the sentence to mirror the deaths of each her boys, Los Angeles County Superior Courtroom Choose Joseph Brandolino sentenced the philanthropist to 2 concurrent phrases, plus one other concurrent three years for fleeing the scene of the deadly crash.

“She is a coward,” Iskander mentioned of Grossman.

However Brandolino mentioned Grossman is “not a monster because the prosecutors portrayed her to be.”

Showing in courtroom along with her hair pulled again in a ponytail and sporting a brown shirt over a white T-shirt and slacks, Grossman, 60, agreed to pay $47,161.89 in restitution to the Iskander household. Her attorneys say the co-founder of the Grossman Burn Basis had already donated $25,000 for funeral bills.

“I by no means noticed anybody,” Grossman mentioned throughout sentencing. “I’d have pushed right into a brick wall. … I don’t know why God didn’t take my life.”

She mentioned she went right into a state of denial after the collision and shut down.

Taking a look at Nancy Iskander, she mentioned tearfully, “My ache is a fraction of your ache.”

Lawyer Ryan Gould mentioned the prosecution was dissatisfied with the end result. “We don’t suppose the choose gave a sentence that was applicable, in gentle of all the things that Ms. Grossman continues to do,” he mentioned.

The sentencing ends an almost four-year legal saga wherein prosecutors say Grossman refused to simply accept accountability for the boys’ deaths and tried to govern the case from behind bars even after her conviction.

After a six-week trial full of dramatic testimony, Grossman was convicted in February of two counts of second-degree homicide, two counts of gross vehicular manslaughter and one rely of hit and run with fatality within the September 2020 killings of the 2 youngsters.

The boys’ mom testified throughout trial that her older youngsters had been strolling forward of her and her youngest son within the marked crosswalk on Triunfo Canyon Street when she heard engines roaring. Two sport utility autos have been barreling towards them.

Iskander dived for security, grabbing her 5-year-old son. Her subsequent reminiscence, she mentioned, is of Jacob and Mark crumpled on the roadway.

Grossman was driving behind Scott Erickson, a former Dodgers participant, who earlier within the day had been ingesting cocktails along with her at a close-by restaurant. She was driving as quick as 81 mph and traveled one other half-mile after slamming into the kids, in keeping with proof introduced at trial.

Nancy Iskander and her husband, Karim, speak with media after Rebecca Grossman was sentenced to fifteen years to life Monday.

(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Instances)

Prosecutors Gould, Habib Balian and Jamie Castro wrote to the choose final week that Grossman confirmed no regret: “The defendant’s actions from September 29, 2020, by means of in the present day present a whole lack of regret and narcissistic superiority that results in just one conclusion, that she will not be deserving of any leniency.”

On Monday, greater than a dozen of the Iskanders’ family and friends members got here earlier than the choose to explain the outlet left after the boys’ deaths and ask that Grossman obtain a prolonged jail time period.

Pastor Chamie Delkeskamp of Ascension Lutheran Church in Thousand Oaks mentioned the deadly crash scarred the whole neighborhood, noting that many youngsters are actually scared to enter a crosswalk. Probation for Grossman “can be a slap within the face of justice,” Delekeskamp mentioned.

Mark Iskander, 11, left, and his brother Jacob have been killed when Rebecca Grossman struck them in a marked crosswalk in Westlake Village in 2020.

(Household picture)

Former babysitter Natalie Nashed famous that the “mindless crime … took two harmless souls.”

Sherif Iskander, the boys’ uncle, mentioned Grossman — whom he described as self-centered and entitled — “tried to get away with homicide.”

“To this present day, she by no means apologized to our household,” he mentioned.

Joyce Ghobrial, the boys’ grandmother, instructed the courtroom: “I’m simply dwelling the remainder of my life to die grieving.” As her voice faltered, Nancy Iskander stood and touched her mom’s again to consolation her.

When Bodie Wallace, who was Jacob’s greatest pal, spoke, Grossman buckled over in her seat, sobbing. The 13-year-old mentioned the music “10,000 Causes” makes him unhappy now as a result of he wonders concerning the “10,000 explanation why Ms. Grossman didn’t say ‘sorry’ straight away.”

Grossman’s attorneys, led by James Spertus, had argued that the mom of two, who had no prior legal document, must be spared jail time. They requested the choose to contemplate probation with a suspended sentence or a shorter jail time period.

Her attorneys painted a far completely different image of Grossman as a “humanitarian” who labored to avoid wasting feminine burn victims and victims of home violence.

Whereas saying the Iskanders’ loss is “incalculable,” Spertus wrote in a sentencing memorandum final week that the Grossmans have skilled a distinct loss: the lack of a mom to her two youngsters, and Grossman herself has misplaced her goal in life and “bears overwhelming unhappiness, despair and remorse for her function within the tragedy.”

He connected a number of letters from Grossman’s household and mates, together with one from Grossman’s son, Nick, who mentioned, “Nothing compares to what the Iskanders are going by means of, however ever because the accident, it’s simply felt just like the world hates my mother and everyone seems to be in opposition to our household.”

On Monday, he addressed the courtroom, saying: “My mom will not be the dangerous individual the media has painted.”

Grossman’s authorized staff performed a 30-minute video that started along with her husband, Dr. Peter Grossman, saying: “We don’t examine our ache to theirs.” The video included daughter Alexis relating how her mom had been deserted by her father and molested by her personal mom’s boyfriend, struggling “each type of abuse by the age of 13.” Nick described his mom as a “very non secular individual.”

Grossman dropped out of school as a result of she couldn’t afford it, her husband mentioned, and have become a flight attendant earlier than beginning her personal medical system enterprise. He additionally recounted the story of a badly burned lady from Afghanistan who was 10 after they took her into their dwelling.

“I give my coronary heart and like to Rebecca,” the now-adult burn affected person, Zubaida, mentioned within the video. “She is my mom.”

However Nancy Iskander rejected the case for Grossman’s compassion. She mentioned when she was within the hospital and a physician outdoors the emergency room requested her about disconnecting Jacob’s life help, she noticed Grossman there.

“She regarded me within the eye,” the grieving mom mentioned, with tears in her eyes and metal in her voice. “That was the second to say one thing.”