Man gets 30-year prison sentence for Courtney Campbell hit-and-run

TAMPA -- For hitting and killing two people on the Courtney Campbell Parkway and then driving off, Armando Lopez-Canada received a 30-year prison sentence today.

The Dec. 28, 2006, accident took the lives of Ronald Bishop Jr., 42, and Joshua Angel Morrow, 4. Bishop's truck had broken down, and he was crossing the busy causeway with the child after getting something to drink when they were hit by Lopez-Canada's sports utility vehicle.

A witness followed the SUV all the way to Clearwater and reported its license plate to authorities.

Lopez-Canada, 27, was driving at the time on an expired license that he had obtained using a Mexican passport and immigration paperwork. His lawyer on Friday wasn't sure whether he had been in the country legally.

The families of the dead grieved in court this morning.

"Your actions broke my heart in a thousand pieces," said Angel Andujar, who along with his wife had been raising their grandson, Joshua.

"No more hugs. No more kisses. No more games with him," he said in Spanish. "All I have is memories of him. Only memories."

Dolores Dininio, Bishop's mother, said her family had scattered her son's ashes in the Gulf of Mexico, as he had asked them to only four days before he died.

Lopez-Canada had pleaded guilty to two counts of leaving the scene of a crash involving death. He didn't have a plea agreement with prosecutors, meaning his fate was up to Circuit Judge Mark Wolfe. The judge handed down a maximum sentence.

- Colleen Jenkins, Times staff writer