Woman who called 911 identified as suspect
Judge Troy Nielsen issued warrants for the arrest and extradition of two suspects in the hit-and-run fatality near Waupaca airport on Sept. 15.
Prosecutors charged Marcos Antonio Tomas, 54, Claremont, Florida, and Felicia Faye Lubin, 34, Evans, Colorado, with hit and run involving death as party to a crime.
Tomas is also charged with causing death while operating without a license.
They face up to 25 years in prison if convicted of the hit-and-run fatality.
According to the criminal complaint, a 911 caller reported seeing a pedestrian on U.S. Highway 10 near Fleet Farm at 1:11 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 15.
Officers responded to the area but were unable to locate anyone.
Second 911 call
At 1:42 a.m.., a woman who identified herself as Felicia Lubin called 911. Her first words were, “Oh my god. What is that?”
She then said she believed somebody was hit by a vehicle on U.S. 10 near the Waupaca airport.
The dispatcher asked the woman several times why she thought somebody was hit.
Lubin said she did not know, she just saw someone get hit, the complaint says.
She said people were driving by and nobody would stop.
Lubin said she walked down the highway for a few minutes but could not see anything because it was too dark.
When officers returned to the area, they found the body of an unknown woman on the eastbound lane near the rumble strips and gravel shoulder.
Waupaca County Detective Sgt. Cameron Durrant and Deputy Adam LaBrosse found two cracked flat mirrors and a convex mirror with a Ford logo on the eastbound roadway and shoulder. The evidence suggested a larger vehicle was involved.
Lange interviews Lubin
At 4:33 a.m. Sunday, Deputy Adam Lange called Lubin.
She said she was on a plane heading back to Colorado where she lives.
Lubin told Lange she had been a rear seat passenger in a Toyota Corolla rental car driven by a friend from Merrill, the complaint says. She said she and two other women were going to the Mitchell Airport in Milwaukee.
She said they were traveling in the left eastbound lane on U.S. 10. Two vehicles were in the right lane in front of them.
The first vehicle had on its bright lights and she thought she saw a person walking on the side of the road.
The second vehicle in the right lane drifted slowly to the right as if the driver were falling asleep, she said.
She heard a loud thump and the pedestrian rolled off onto the side of the road.
Lubin said they stopped the vehicle near Harrington Road.
She estimated a three-minute delay between the hit-and-run and her call to 911.
Officers listened to the 911 recording and heard a male voice in the background.
Identifying suspect vehicle
Shortly after 6 p.m. Sunday, Sgt. Clint Thobaben identified the victim as Jacqueline A. Johnson, 49, Waupaca.
On Wednesday, Sept. 18, Lange contacted the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office.
He learned nobody returned a damaged Toyota rental car on Sunday or that a car had been rented to Lubin or the woman she said was driving.
On Friday, Sept. 20, Lange and LaBrosse went to Mitchell Airport.
They viewed security video of Lubin presenting her boarding pass at the terminal gate.
Using video from multiple cameras, the deputies followed Lubin’s progress through the airport backwards from the gate to where a Penske rental van dropped her off at the airport at 3:40 a.m.
Damage to the van’s passenger side mirror and headlight were consistent to the vehicle parts found on U.S. 10.
The driver was an African American male.
Linking van to possible driver
Penske had rented the van to Wachter Network Services in Lowell, Arkansas.
Tomas had been working for the company on a wiring job in Merrill.
He returned the van on Sept. 20.
Lowell police interviewed Tomas regarding the hit-and-run.
Tomas reportedly said another employee had been driving the van.
Investigators discovered that employee was in jail in Tupelo, Mississippi, from Sept. 13-16.
As of Sept. 24, Tomas has not returned to his job in Lowell and his whereabouts are unknown.
On Sept. 23, Waupaca County Detective Sgt. Pat McClone and Sgt. Kevin Studzinski traveled to Lowell, where they reviewed the van’s GPS records.
They found that the van was at a Merrill gas station at 12:10 a.m. Sept. 15, and stopped at 1:36 a.m. on U.S. 10 near Vaughn Road in the town of Lind for approximately five minutes.
Deputies obtained a still photo of the African American man who bought gas in Merrill.
The photo was consistent with the man who dropped Lubin off at the airport.
Tomas’ Florida driver’s license expired on June 2, 2018, and has not been reinstated.
Lubin is currently in custody in Colorado and waiting to be extradited to Wisconsin.