DENVER — Coban Porter, the brother of Denver Nuggets star Michael Porter Jr., was sentenced to six years in prison Friday for killing a woman in a drunk-driving crash last year.

Porter, 22, pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide and vehicular assault in February on the condition that he would be sentenced to no more than eight years in prison. He could have faced up to 12 years in prison without the plea agreement.

“All I can really say is that I’m sorry,” Porter said in a Denver courtroom Friday. “I know that I’m never going to be able to right that wrong. … I never thought I’d be standing here. I thought I was invincible. It wasn’t the first time I chose to drink and drive. … I’m so sorry.”

Porter was driving drunk just before 2 a.m. on Jan. 22, 2023, when he ran a red light and crashed into another vehicle at the intersection of South University and Buchtel boulevards in Denver. The other driver, Kathy Limon Rothman, 42, was killed, and a passenger in her vehicle was seriously injured.

Prosecutors on Friday said Porter was driving 50 mph in a 30-mph zone and his blood-alcohol level was .19, more than twice the legal limit of .08. Rothman, mother to a young son, was working as an Uber driver at the time.

Connie Johnson, Rothman’s mother, said in court Friday that her life ended in the crash along with her daughter’s.

“This pain and trauma have become my worst reality,” she said. “… Every part of my life that brings joy and happiness is met in tandem with the anguish of her absence. …His choice caused my grandson to grow up without a mother. Caused my son-in-law to be a widower, and caused my husband and I to lose a child.”

Many people spoke both for Rothman’s family and in support of Porter during the emotional hearing in Denver District Court on Friday. Michael Porter Jr. described how he was the first in his family to learn about the fatal crash, when a police officer called to tell him around 7 a.m. that morning.

“He said, ‘Coban has been in a fatal accident.’ He didn’t specify if Coban was the one who died or if it was someone else,” Michael Porter Jr. said, turning to Rothman’s family. “I understand your family’s pain and hurt. When he didn’t specify what it was, I felt that. I know that if I were in your shoes and it was reversed, I would have a lot of feelings as well.”

He and others described Coban Porter as a man of quality character, a hard worker full of remorse for his actions.

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