A Louisiana woman was sentenced to 20 years behind bars after she pleaded guilty to killing a father-of-seven in a horrific drunk driving crash.

Olivia Matte, 28, was handed down the sentence on Thursday for the crash that left married Mississippi man James Blackmond, 37, impaled by a broken guardrail.

It was Matte's third driving while intoxicated accident in just nine months.

The accident took place on March 23, 2017 when Matte, of Covington, rear-ended Blackmond's red pick-up truck in the early hours of the morning as she was driving southbound on the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway bridge.

Louisiana woman Olivia Matte, 28, was sentenced to 20 years in jail on Thursday for killing Mississippi man James Blackmond, 37, in a drunk driving crash

In the horrific crash on March 23, 2017 Matte rear-ended Blackmond's red pick-up truck, sending his car onto a guardrail. A piece of the aluminum railing broke off and penetrated his car window, impaling him. The wreckage of the car pictured above

The guardrail broke through the back of the car and impaled Blackmond who was in the driver's seat. The damage of the car crash on the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway bridge pictured above

She hit him with such force his car was thrown onto an aluminum guardrail along the side of the bridge. The car then traveled backwards on the railing about 100 feet and a broken section of the guardrail penetrated his rear window and impaled Blackmond, according to Nola.com.

He was pronounced dead at the scene. Blackmond's passenger Kelly Johnson was also wounded in the crash. Matte was uninjured in the accident.

Officials said Matte 'failed miserably' when she was administered a breathalyzer test after the accident.

Her blood alcohol content was .216 at the time of the crash, nearly three times higher than the legal limit of 0.08 percent, according to WWLTV.

Blackmond was from Mississippi and was a beloved husband and father-of-seven

Blackmond pictured above with his wife Queenita Blackmond. At Matte's Thursday sentencing she said: 'Olivia Matte didn’t just kill my husband, she killed me, also'

She pleaded guilty on September 4 to a slew of charges including vehicular homicide, careless operation of a vehicle and operating a vehicle with a suspended license.

But this wasn't the first strike for Matte. She was previously booked for suspected drunk driving on that same bridge on June 12, 2016. She was arrested by Louisiana police on another DWI incident on December 7, 2016.

Blackmond and Matte's families testified before Judge Glenn Ansardi on Thursday before the sentencing.

'Olivia Matte didn’t just kill my husband, she killed me, also. Olivia Matte choosing to drink and drive cost me my everything. Her total disregard for life cost me mine,' Blackmond's wife Queenita Blackmond said.

'Everything reminds me of him,' she added.

Olivia Matte's vehicle was also severely damaged in the crash. It was her third DWI incident over the past nine months

Matte was uninjured in the horrific accident that took Blackmond's life. Her damaged car pictured after the crash

The Blackmond family asked for a sentence of 25 to 30 years.

According to Matte's family she is a outgoing and caring woman who quickly and 'almost secretly' spiraled into crisis.

'Olivia is a good person who made not just a mistake, but a terrible mistake and one she is going to pay for,' her father Barry Matte said, apologizing to the Blackmond family directly according to The New Orleans Advocate.

'I am sorry and I've always been sorry. I wanted it to have been me gone, not him,' Matte testified.

She confessed to the court that she was abusing alcohol after becoming depressed and felt unsure of what to do with her life.