{"id":159016,"date":"2026-02-17T22:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T22:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/159016\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T22:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T22:56:08","slug":"man-sentenced-to-prison-for-2024-fatal-hit-and-run-involving-fsu-student","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/159016\/","title":{"rendered":"Man sentenced to prison for 2024 fatal hit-and-run involving FSU student"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) &#8211; Willis Trueblood was sentenced to 8 years in prison on Tuesday after a deadly hit-and-run in 2024 that killed a Florida State University student. Trueblood\u2019s license was also suspended. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The student killed in the crash was 20-year-old Ellie Sims. The crash happened near the intersection of Lorene and Pensacola Street, which students described as always being busy. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sims\u2019 family spoke at Tuesday\u2019s sentencing hearing. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Trueblood entered an open plea in court in January and could have faced up to 30 years in prison. The sentencing guideline suggested a 12-year sentence, but the judge granted a downward departure and sentenced Trueblood to 8 years in state prison, according to court records.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"figure-img img-fluid mx-auto d-block\" alt=\"Tallahassee Police Department announced Tuesday it arrested 18-year-old Willis Trueblood Jr....\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/PBMV5JP4M5HFTJ5GXI57V3O4AU.jpg\" width=\"980\" height=\"551\" \/>Tallahassee Police Department announced Tuesday it arrested 18-year-old Willis Trueblood Jr. for leaving the scene of the fatal hit-and-run.(Leon County Sheriff&#8217;s Office)<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Court records at the time describe Trueblood being scared and sick after the crash, saying he left the scene because he panicked. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Students and parents laid flowers and notes at the site of the crash in the days that followed the deadly hit-and-run. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"figure-img img-fluid mx-auto d-block\" alt=\"One mom, whos child knew Sims, left an image of a penguin because she know Sims liked them.\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/T5GNKAHEQ5EELPW6HWPJWZ7QUM.png\" width=\"980\" height=\"551\" \/>One mom, whos child knew Sims, left an image of a penguin because she know Sims liked them.(WCTV)<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">An\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.change.org\/p\/add-a-traffic-light-to-pensecola-cross-walk?recruiter=1337518347&amp;recruited_by_id=71a5cc20-06f5-11ef-9591-1b0276dff605&amp;utm_source=share_petition&amp;utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&amp;utm_term=psf&amp;utm_medium=copylink&amp;utm_content=cl_sharecopy_490035911_en-US%3Acv_1094746\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">online petition\u00a0<\/a>to add a traffic light to the intersection near West Pensacola and Lorene Streets gained over 26,000 signatures after Sims\u2019 death. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">To keep up with the latest news as it develops, follow WCTV on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/WCTV.tv\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/wctvnews\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@WCTVEyewitnessNews\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/nextdoor.com\/page\/wctv\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/nextdoor.com\/page\/wctv\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nextdoor<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/nextdoor.com\/page\/wctv\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/nextdoor.com\/page\/wctv\/\" target=\"_blank\"> <\/a>and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WCTV\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">X<\/a> (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WCTV\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Twitter<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Have a news tip or see an error? <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wctv.tv\/2026\/02\/17\/man-sentenced-prison-2024-fatal-hit-and-run-involving-fsu-student\/mailto:news@wctv.tv?subject=Correction%20Needed\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Write to us here<\/a>. Please include the article\u2019s headline in your message.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Be the first to see all the biggest headlines by downloading the WCTV News app. Click <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wctv.tv\/2024\/12\/18\/download-free-wctv-mobile-streaming-apps-today\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a> to get started.<\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright |\">Copyright 2026 WCTV. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) &#8211; Willis Trueblood was sentenced to 8 years in prison on Tuesday after a deadly&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159017,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[1368,56444,3530,3603,5154,1225,6562,2371,1935,2956,232,234,233,76213],"class_list":{"0":"post-159016","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tallahassee","8":"tag-1368","9":"tag-ellie-sims","10":"tag-fatal","11":"tag-fsu","12":"tag-hit-and-run","13":"tag-jail","14":"tag-pedestrian","15":"tag-prison","16":"tag-sentencing","17":"tag-student","18":"tag-tallahassee","19":"tag-tallahassee-headlines","20":"tag-tallahassee-news","21":"tag-willis-trueblood"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}