South Jersey man faces up to 24 years in prison for road-rage killing at a McDonald’s parking lot in Bucks

A Burlington County man who deliberately ran over and killed another driver during a road-rage argument in February was sentenced Wednesday to 12-to-24 years in state prison.

Daniel Dietrich, 46, pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter, accidents involving death, and related offenses for killing Jason Smith with his pickup truck in the parking lot of a McDonald’s in Bristol Township.

Dietrich, of Palmyra, fled the scene and did not report the crash to police, according to prosecutors. Smith, 47, was taken by medics to Jefferson Torresdale Hospital, where he was later pronounced dead of severe, blunt-force injuries.

Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub, who prosecuted the case, said Smith’s family had agreed to the terms of the plea, and felt it was the best resolution to the case. Weintraub, in what will likely be his last appearance as a prosecutor before assuming a judgeship in January, said he believed that in another life, Smith and Dietrich could have been friends, given their similar backgrounds.

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“But for an incident that got way beyond out of control and deadly, these two families’ lives would not be ruined, and we would not be here,” Weintraub said.

Smith’s attorney, Steven Jones, said he and his client agreed that the negotiated plea was appropriate.

“Unfortunately, there are no winners in the case,” Jones said. “And the biggest losers are the families of the two people involved here.”

An anonymous tip led investigators to Dietrich’s home about a month after the incident, as media reports circulated of Weintraub asking for help in solving the case.

In an interview with detectives, Dietrich initially lied, and accused Smith of following him into the McDonald’s parking lot after he cut Smith off while trying to merge on Bristol Pike.

But detectives, in reviewing surveillance footage from the McDonald’s, found evidence that clashed with Dietrich’s version of what happened.

That footage showed, instead, that Dietrich followed Smith into the parking lot and used his Chevrolet Silverado to block Smith from leaving, according to the affidavit of probable cause for Dietrich’s arrest. Smith got out of his truck, carrying a carpenter’s hammer, and approached Dietrich’s truck, the footage showed.

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Dietrich then suddenly accelerated, turning sharply toward Smith and knocking him down. The truck then drove up and over his body, “visibly bouncing,” prosecutors said Wednesday, noting that Dietrich had plenty of room to leave the parking lot without striking Smith.

“There were alternative routes and measures Mr. Dietrich could have taken that day, and there were for Mr. Smith as well,” Weintraub said. “But as for who must accept blame, Mr. Smith is not here to do so.”

Smith’s fiancée, Elise Gillin, lamented the loss of the man she called her “soulmate,” whom she had planned to marry in October. Every day since his death, she said, has been a struggle as she mourns a life with him that she never got to live.

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“We had so many memories to make, and that was taken from us by someone with a total disregard for life,” Gillin said in a statement she read in court through tears. “So many lives were destroyed on February 5, 2023. I wish I could turn back the clock and change it, but, unfortunately, I can’t.”

Smith’s parents and daughter described him as a beacon of light, someone whose presence improved others’ moods and who made fast friends.

In handing down the sentence Wednesday, Bucks County Court Judge Raymond McHugh said he had been profoundly moved by their words. They had, the judge said, described a man with “a beautiful soul.”

“There’s nothing I can say that will bring Jason Smith back. If there was, I would say it,” McHugh said. “I can feel the love. I can feel the pain. I feel it as if I was sitting there with you, and I wish you peace.”