Jury has begun deliberating in case of woman accused of hitting and killing 17-year-old cyclist Magnus White after falling asleep driving

The jury in the case of Yeva Smilianska, a 24-year-old who stayed up all night hanging out with a friend drinking before she hit a 17-year-old cyclist driving home, has to decide whether falling asleep at the wheel and killing someone is a tragic accident or a crime. 

Deliberations started Friday around 3 p.m. after closing arguments. 

The trial revealed that Smilianska stayed up until at least 6 a.m. drinking whiskey and texted her friend that she was “falling asleep” but chose to drive home the morning she struck White from behind on July 29, 2023. 

Witnesses testified that Smilianska’s car swerved onto the shoulder on Highway 119 — the Diagonal — at least twice before she hit White. 

On the stand through a translator Thursday, Smilianska, the 24-year-old immigrant from Ukraine who was also wearing AirPods listening to a podcast at the time, said she remembers holding the wheel, and then the next thing she recalled was her car hitting a fence off the side of the road. She testified that she has no memory of hitting White.

The defense and the prosecution agree to the timeline of events and her extreme exhaustion. 

“Very few facts in this case are in dispute,” said defense attorney Timur Kishinevsky in his closing arguments on Friday. “But this was an act of careless driving.”

The prosecution sharply disagreed. 

“A person who looks at their cell phone for just a moment driving 10-15 mph and hits some kid in the crosswalk — that's careless driving resulting in death,” said Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty. “That is not this case. Careless driving doesn't involve someone staying up all night, drinking, washing down prescription meds with whiskey … choosing to get no sleep. Going on the shoulder, passing out from complete exhaustion, and then hitting the kid at 60 mph.”

The jury does have the opportunity to charge Smilianska with the lesser count of careless driving resulting in death instead of the felony vehicular homicide charges. 

Smilianska’s drinking was a point of contention throughout the trial and even played out during the closing arguments — how much she drank the night before and at what time, and when she stopped drinking. But the case isn’t being tried as a driving under the influence case. 

Ethan Glading/USA Cycling

State attorney Patricia Mittlestadt said “This is not a DUI case” seven times in the half-hour that she spoke. 

“Her behavior was reckless because she made decision after decision after decision. Where she could have made different decisions, but she didn't, because she consciously disregarded the substantial risk to get behind the wheel that day,” Mittlestadt said. 

However, the defense took the opposite view in closing, accusing the prosecution of not being honest with the jury. 

“They said this case is not about alcohol, it's not about intoxication. Really? This case is nothing but about alcohol and intoxication. This whole case is about consumption of alcohol,” said Kishinevsky.  

He said it’s easier to find someone guilty if alcohol is involved and, “This is a case about being tired. Being tired is not reckless driving.” 

Among the testimony was White’s father, Michael White, and many law enforcement officials who investigated the crash or were at the scene that day in 2023. Smilianska’s friend with whom she hung out with the night before the crash testified that she asked Smilianska to stay at her house or to get coffee with her. Through a translator, Smilianska also took the stand. 

She had first claimed that her car’s steering had malfunctioned causing the crash, but admitted on the stand to passing out from exhaustion. She testified that she maintained that story about a malfunction because she wanted to believe White’s death was the car’s fault and didn’t want to tell officers at the scene of investigators later that she had fallen asleep.

“Again, I really didn't want to believe in that, and I couldn't accept that,” she said through the translator on Friday morning,

White was considered a rising star in the cycling world at the time of his death. He won the 2021 Junior 17-18 Cyclocross National Championship. He represented the USA Cycling National Team over two full seasons of European Cyclocross racing and at the 2022 and 2023 UCI Cyclocross World Championships. 

He had earned a spot on the U.S. Mountain Bike World Championship team and was preparing to compete at the World Mountain Bike World Championships in Glasgow, Scotland when the accident occurred. He died from his injuries wearing a USA National Team kit.

White’s parents through the White Line Foundation have worked to bring awareness to rider safety through legislation on the local, state and federal levels.