SAN DIEGO -- A man accused of driving drunk and hitting a parked car on a freeway shoulder on New Year's Day, killing a young woman who was six months pregnant, was charged Wednesday with vehicular manslaughter and DUI counts.

Joseph Anthony Venegas, 40, faces 16 years in prison if convicted of one count of gross vehicular manslaughter and two counts of DUI causing injury, said Deputy District Attorney Corinne Miesfeld.

Arraignment for Venegas was postponed until Friday morning because he was in medical isolation, authorities said.

The defendant is accused of causing the accident about 3 a.m. on New Year's Day that took the life of 21-year-old Elaina Luquis-Ortiz, whose unborn child had already been given the name Romeo Francisco, and injured two other people.

No decision has been made on whether to charge Venegas in connection with the death of the fetus, Miesfeld said.

The victim's husband, Francisco, is a 22-year-old Marine stationed at Miramar.

Holding a photo of his wife, he told reporters that his unborn son had his nose and his wife's chin.

Other family members were upset that Venegas was not brought to court for arraignment.

The victim's sister, Julie Pineda, said the defendant should have to pay for what he allegedly did.

"Why?" Pineda asked. "You could have slept in your back seat. It's not fair. She (the victim) should have been here. She should have been here to give birth to her son. It's his fault -- everything."

The victim's brother, Richard Anthony Maldonado, told reporters that Venegas made a choice to drink and drive.

"How come his friends didn't stop him?" Maldonado asked.

The victim and her husband, from Lemon Grove, were at a friend's home about 1:30 a.m. on New Year's when they got a phone call from another friend saying the Mitsubishi Spyder she was driving had a flat tire on Interstate 805, south of Home Avenue.

Luquis-Ortiz was in the process of selling the Mitsubishi to the friend, but since the insurance policy was still in her name, she drove in her Mazda sedan to see if she could help her friend.

The victim, her friend and the friend's cousin were waiting in her sedan behind the disabled car when a black Chevrolet Tahoe smashed into them, authorities said.

Luquis-Ortiz died almost instantly, and her friends were seriously injured.

Francisco Ortiz said he and his wife met via MySpace through a mutual friend in the summer of 2008 and married three months later. She quit her job at JCPenney in November to prepare for the birth of her son, friends said.