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Residents Demand Justice After Motorcyclist Killed Former State Rep. Wants Obama To Explain Immigration Policies POSTED: 12:23 pm EDT August 23, 2011 UPDATED:
BOSTON -- Some members of the Milford community are demanding justice after a young man there was hit and killed while riding his motorcycle Saturday night after being dragged under a pickup truck for several blocks.
Police said the driver of the truck that hit the victim, Nicolas Guaman, 34, is an Ecuadoran who is in the U.S. illegally and has a lengthy and violent criminal record.
Now, some Milford residents are urging President Barack Obama to get involved. Marie Parente is one of them. She spent years representing the Milford area as a state representative and now, she's written an open letter to Obama urging him to come to her community after the death of Matthew Denice, 23, who was hit and killed in Milford Saturday night.
"It would help these young people, the family, to know that someone with that kind of power responded," Parente said.
Denice was riding his motorcycle when a pickup truck hit him, dragging him nearly a quarter of a mile, investigators said.
Police charged Guaman with Denice's death. They said he was driving drunk and is in this country illegally. They said he also has a lengthy criminal record.
Parente said it's the third death involving an illegal immigrant in Milford in the last two years.
She believes Guaman might have been apprehended sooner if tougher immigration laws were in place, something she thinks Obama needs to explain.
"Tell them why you want to give in-state tuition and amnesty to this illegal population, explain it to them. Because one of them killed their friend," Parente said.
Denice's relatives and friends are preparing to honor Matthew with a vigil Friday night at 7:50 p.m. in Milford at Draper Memorial Park.
