Breaking: Suspended sentence for driver who killed Concordian Tamar Vishlitzky

The man accused of hitting and killing a Acton woman with his car in 2024 pleaded guilty Thursday during an emotional hearing at Acton District Court.

Family members of Tamar Vishlitzky delivered victim impact statements. Joshua Quimby formally changed his plea to a charge of motor vehicle homicide by negligent operation.

Quimby’s two-year jail sentence is suspended for three years, meaning he won’t be locked up unless he violates his probation. He must perform 100 hours of community service at a facility or organization serving people with traumatic brain injuries. He also loses his driver’s license for 15 years.

The maximum possible sentence was 2.5 years in prison.

Vishlitzky’s sister, Ruthie, said the family is “devastated” by the lesser punishment, but they were already “bracing for disappointment” based on conversations with prosecutors. Family members said even the maximum penalty seemed too lenient.

Quimby had no comment when approached by a Acton Bridge reporter.

His attorney, Michael Conant, said his client has “taken full responsibility for his actions” and that he thinks the sentence from Judge Sharon Lalli “strikes the right balance.”

He said this was a “tragic accident.”

‘Coming into her own’

Vishlitzky was an artist and psychotherapist who had recently moved to Acton. She originally went to school for art and later shifted careers into mental health.

Family members speaking with The Bridge said she enjoyed frequent walks at places such as Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. 

She was enjoying what Ruthie Vishlitzky described as “a recent love affair with Acton” and exploring new artistic projects alongside her psychotherapy career. 

“She was really kind of coming into her own,” Ruthie Vishlitzky said. “It felt like she was embarking on a really exciting, fun phase of her life.”

Tamar Vishlitzky, 53, died July 20, 2024. Officials said she was walking her bike across Acton Road at the Reformatory Branch Trail in Bedford when a car driven by Quimby, now 35, of Billerica hit her.

Prosecutors said Quimby was driving with a suspended license and using his phone. Assistant District Attorney Jenna Scott said he told officers he was trying to plug the phone into a charger. 

Though that may be true, Scott said, “his phone also shows that he was sending messages and using different apps” immediately before the crash.

Scott said Quimby was speeding, and investigators found no sign of braking before he hit Tamar Vishlitzky. 

Prosecutors charged Quimby this past summer — roughly a year after the crash — and he initially pleaded not guilty.

Impact statements

Family members said Tamar Vishlitzky’s soon-to-be son-in-law was riding with her and planned to ask for her blessing to marry her eldest daughter, Danielle. 

Ruthie Vishlitzky said, “She didn’t have a chance to hear him ask.”

Danielle Vishlitzky and Gerardo Zelaya married after Tamar died. Gerardo told the court he’s dealt with “constant nightmares.” He’s a schoolteacher and also described working with students with disabilities. 

He said the sounds of those students being fed through feeding tubes or the sounds of some students’ breathing remind him of Tamar Vishlitzky’s labored last breath.

Danielle said she continues to mourn the loss, and “it gets harder with each holiday we cannot share.”

Tamar’s youngest daughter, Halle, described how her mother often rode her bike and said she did yoga and pilates most mornings. Halle Vishlitzky once asked her mother why she wouldn’t stay in and watch TV with her. 

“I have to stay healthy so I can live as long as possible,” Tamar Vishlitzky said. “I have too many people relying on me.” 

Recalling that exchange, Halle said, “Her worst nightmare has come true.”

Scott, the assistant district attorney, read an impact statement co-signed by area mental health professionals who said some of Tamar’s patients struggled to build rapport with new providers; some dropped out of treatment altogether. 

‘Constant warmth and love’

Tamar Vishlitzky’s mother, Mareska, said she’s still in a “state of shock” but mourned how “Tamar will not be there” to encourage her children as they pursue their own art careers. 

Tamar Vishlitzky was a single mother. Mareska previously told The Bridge that Tamar was close with her kids and showered them with “constant warmth and love and empowerment.” 

She has maintained a “ghost bike” memorial at the crash site and has concerns about the state’s laws around the kind of crash that killed her daughter. She’s also said phone manufacturers should create features that prevent people from using their devices while driving. 

“The community needs protection,” she told The Bridge. 

Halle Vishlitzky told The Bridge about a trip with her mother to a craft school in North Carolina a few weeks before Tamar Vishlitzky died.

“I got to see her really making art for the first time,” she said, “and I just saw how incredible she was at it.”

Asked about her sister, Ruthie Vishlitzky remembered “looking at her with awe” as a younger sibling. Tamar would buy clothing during her teenage years and close her bedroom door when she returned home. 

“You could hear ripping and cutting and whatever, and she’d come out with off-the-shoulder and ripped jeans in the knees and all the fashion,” Ruthie Vishlitzky told The Bridge. 

Loss compounded

Ruthie had been living in New York City. She said Tamar’s dad died 10 months before Tamar’s death. Tamar Vishlitzky had been writing a eulogy for their father, who was cremated. 

The family ended up burying both Tamar and her dad at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery on the same day. Tamar Vishlitzky’s daughters read the eulogy she had intended to deliver for her father. Ruthie moved to Brookline in August to live with her mother. 

“Since we were just a family of four and we lost 50%,” she said, “it just felt untenable and very stressful to be physically far.” 

Halle Vishlitzky spoke with The Bridge from her mother’s Acton home, with some of Tamar’s artworks on the wall behind her. 

Ruthie Vishlitzky and her mother are renovating their Brookline home, which has plenty of wall space for Tamar’s large paintings. 

“We are looking forward to hanging as much as possible,” Mareska Vishlitzky said.

This breaking story has been updated.