A Milford man who allegedly made a U-turn at high speed during a road-rage incident and ran his car into a 26-year-old woman who later died is now facing a murder charge, Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan’s office said Monday.
The day after the April 4 incident on Route 85 in Hopkinton, Ryan Sweatt, 36, pleaded not guilty in Framingham District Court to charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon causing serious bodily injury, operating to endanger, and a marked lanes violation.
Destini Decoff, of Milford, died from her injuries at UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester two days after she was hit.
Sweatt now faces the “additional charge of murder in connection with striking and killing of Destini Decoff,” Ryan said in a joint statement with Hopkinton Chief of Police Joseph Bennett.
Sweatt, who is being held in Middlesex Jail, is scheduled for arraignment on the murder charge Tuesday in Framingham, online records show.
According to prosecutors, Sweatt was driving a Honda Civic when he “became enraged” with a vehicle that Decoff was a passenger in. That car stopped, and Decoff and other people in the car got out.
That’s when Sweatt allegedly made the U-turn and “struck the victim in the roadway,” prosecutors said.
On Facebook, Tracy Decoff recalled her daughter as her best friend and promised to obtain justice for her.
“you know I don’t break promises & i promise you with every ounce of my being I will get justice for you regardless of what it takes!” Decoff wrote the day after her daughter died. “go spread those beautiful wings & fly without pain & suffering . . . as our family says see ya love ya.”
Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com. Follow her @talanez.