Newlywed on honeymoon killed in hit-and-run in 2021, Florida cops say. Now two charged
More than two years after a hit-and-run crash killed a newlywed on his way to his Florida honeymoon, a couple has been charged, state patrol told news outlets.
Christopher and Mary Coffey, high school sweethearts from Tennessee, were driving in Daytona Beach on their way to a honeymoon cruise on Sept. 12, 2021, when a car approached them on the side from an on-ramp, according to WKMG and a Dec. 12 news release from the Florida Highway Patrol obtained by WOFL.
The Coffeys, 29 and 27, were in a Dodge Ram truck when the other car, a Dodge Charger, hit them as they traveled south on Interstate 95, state troopers told the outlet.
The front of the Charger hit the back right of the Ram, highway patrol told The Daytona Beach News-Journal, causing the Charger to spin out into the center lane of traffic and the truck to roll.
The truck overturned multiple times before it went into the grass and hit a utility pole, rolled down an embankment and landed in a drainage canal, troopers told the outlet.
“The crazy thing is, it was a brand new, giant truck. It was a huge truck,” Mary Coffey’s sister Allison Moore told WOFL in 2021. “The fact that whatever happened, was able to flip that truck so much. I think they flipped around 10 times around there.”
The Charger fled the crash scene, troopers told news outlets.
In a GoFundMe from 2021, the Coffeys’ family said both Mary and Chris had injuries, but Chris sustained significant brain injuries during the crash.
Chris Coffey died six days later on Sept. 18, his family said, just seven days after their wedding.
“Mary and Chris had the happiest day of their life Saturday, and the worst barely 24 hours later,” Moore wrote on GoFundMe.
The driver of the Charger remained a mystery until Dec. 12 when the Florida Highway Patrol announced charges against an Orlando married couple, WKMG reported.
The Florida Highway Patrol said 32-year-olds Megan and Jeffrey Brannan were in the Charger the night of the crash, with Megan behind the wheel, according to the outlet.
Megan Brannan was charged with leaving the scene of a fatal crash and leaving the scene of a crash involving serious injury, FHP told news outlets.
Her husband, who was in the passenger seat at the time of the crash, was charged with accessory after the fact, troopers told news outlets.
Daytona Beach is about 90 miles south of Jacksonville.
This story was originally published December 13, 2023 at 9:47 AM with the headline "Newlywed on honeymoon killed in hit-and-run in 2021, Florida cops say. Now two charged."
