CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The family of Samantha Miller, the South Carolina bride who was killed by an alleged drunk driver just hours after her wedding last month, is sharing the final words she spoke to her husband just before the deadly crash.
Lisa Miller, Samantha's mother, told NBC's "Today" show that she spoke with her daughter's husband, Aric Hutchinson, in the hospital.
"She looked at him on a golf cart and said, 'I want this day, this evening, to last forever,' on the golf cart right before it happened," Miller said.
The couple was leaving their reception in Folly Beach when a suspected drunk driver crashed into them from behind at approximately 65 mph. Samantha was pronounced dead at the scene. Aric and two other family members were rushed to the hospital with serious injuries, according to police records.
Miller said once she heard sirens, she knew something happened to her daughter, confirming what her other daughter said transpired after the wreck.
"I don't know how I did," Miller said. "But I'm like, 'Something happened to Sam.' I literally screamed it. And that's when I called her and she didn't answer."
"My mom and I ran holding hands," Mandi Jenkins said. "No shoes, no bra, no nothing. Just screaming,' Sammy!'"
Investigators said the couple's golf cart, which had lights and was legal to drive at night, was thrown over 100 yards and flipped several times. The driver who crashed into them, 25-year-old Jamie Lee Komoroski, was charged with reckless homicide and DUI involving death. A toxicology report showed her blood alcohol level was more than three times the legal limit of 0.08.
*Editor's note: A previous version of this story referred to the bride as Samantha Hutchinson. Her family has asked us to use Miller since her last night had not been changed before the accident.
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