30-year-old is no stranger to answering for drunk driving

A 30-year-old habitually impaired driver was arrested again Monday after deputies reported to Historic City News that she nearly collapsed when she was asked to step out of her car.

The driver, Jamie Marie Klapatch who resides at 2962 Gray Jay Drive in Saint Augustine, was spotted as she was heading down Anastasia Boulevard late at night.  Deputies said her car was swerving and that she nearly hit a wall.

According to arresting officers, her car was traveling at a speed of 54-mph in a 30-mph zone. Klapatch was stopped and administered a field sobriety test, which she reportedly failed.  She was arrested on suspicion of DUI and booked into the St Johns County Jail early Monday.  No one was hurt during Klapatch’s most recent traffic stop.

Klapatch was previously convicted of leaving the scene of a crash in 2007.  According to a Jacksonville police report, shortly after she fled from that crash, she crashed into another vehicle. Investigators said that in the second crash, Klapatch killed her passenger, 17-year-old Haley Moore of St Augustine.

Klapatch had a combination of drugs in her system at the time of the two 2007 crashes, and she was sentenced to 30-days in jail for the hit-and-run; however, she was never charged with Haley’s death.  Further, since the 2007 deadly crash, records show Klapatch was arrested again in 2015 on three DUI charges.

Vickie Moore, Haley Moore’s mother, stated in a televised news interview that she wants to see a full investigation of the traffic homicide that took her daughter’s life in 2007.  After hearing the news of the Monday incident, Moore said that she was not surprised to learn Klapatch had been arrested again for DUI.

“I want answers, I don’t want excuses anymore.”  Moore said in the interview earlier this week.  “I don’t think Haley got the justice she should have gotten,” Moore said.  She believes that if Klapatch had stopped following the first crash, her daughter would still be alive. 

“I don’t understand what it’s going to take – either her killing herself or killing someone else again.”  Twelve years after her loss, Moore is wondering why Klapatch’s car keys haven’t been taken away. This time, Moore said that she’s working with local organizations to toughen DUI laws and is hoping justice prevails.