Soma-Impaired Driver Gets Seven Years for Killing Bicyclist; Aaron Chubick Also Fled Scene | Valley Fever | Phoenix | Phoenix New Times | The Leading Independent News Source in Phoenix, Arizona
Navigation

Soma-Impaired Driver Gets Seven Years for Killing Bicyclist; Aaron Chubick Also Fled Scene

  A Peoria father of three boys who creamed a bicyclist in 2008 while drugged up on Soma was sentenced last week to seven years in prison.   Aaron Chubick pleaded guilty in September to manslaughter and hit-and-run in the collision that killed Richard Markarian, a retired lab tech for General Electric...
Share this:

  A Peoria father of three boys who creamed a bicyclist in 2008 while drugged up on Soma was sentenced last week to seven years in prison.

 

Aaron Chubick pleaded guilty in September to manslaughter and hit-and-run in the collision that killed Richard Markarian, a retired lab tech for General Electric who'd moved to Peoria in 1999.

At 65, Markarian was a fitness buff and early-bird who arose at 3 a.m. every morning to go on a bike ride. He was outfitted with lights and reflectors as he rolled down Beardsley Road near 91st Avenue on the morning of October 26, 2008, but the precautions didn't help.

Chubick, coming up behind him, was reportedly too plowed to stand up, much less drive.

The 2003 pickup hit a curb, then smashed into Markarian.

In one particularly chilling section of the police report on the collision, Chubick is reported to have seen Markarian still moving as he drove away.

The seven years of prison time stems from the manslaughter charge; he'll also serve three years' probation for the hit-and-run charge.

The toxicology report stated that Chubick had five or six times the "therapeutic" level of Soma in his system on the night of the collision. He'd also ingested the sleep-aids Lunesta and Ambien.

Too bad he didn't just go to bed.

BEFORE YOU GO...
Can you help us continue to share our stories? Since the beginning, Phoenix New Times has been defined as the free, independent voice of Phoenix — and we'd like to keep it that way. Our members allow us to continue offering readers access to our incisive coverage of local news, food, and culture with no paywalls.