Someone drives illegally. They* strike and kill a cyclist.
That driver has been sentenced to…
**
…five months in jail. Oh, and the badass judge tacked 40 hours of “community service” and “no more than five years” of probation.
Call me cynical, but I think the judge handed a sentence, light as it is yet still harsher than most for similar infractions because:
- the cyclist was a priest and
- as Paul Walsh, a reporter for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune noted, Trejean D. Curry had “a penchant for driving without a license.”
A “penchant for driving without a license.” According to a court filing, Curry has never had a driver’s license in his home state of Minnesota. Yet, by the afternoon of 25 October 2021, when he plowed into Rev. Dennis Dempsey from behind, Curry had accumulated “10 convictions for operating a vehicle while his driving privileges were revoked, six for lack of insurance, two for speeding, two for instructional permit violations, one for expired tabs and one for passing another vehicle in a prohibited area.”
 |
| Rev. Dennis Dempsey R.I.P. |
All of that when he didn’t have a license? To me, the most pertinent question is: How and why was this guy even on the road on the afternoon of 25 October 2021?
Oh, and he had the gall to claim that Dempsey had swerved in front of him. Skid marks and other evidence pointed to the exact opposite: Curry swerved, accidentally or not, into Dempsey’s path on the should of the road where the driver and cyclist were traveling in the same direction.
I will end with two more questions: Will the jail sentence, “community service” and probation—even if they are served in full—change Curry’s behavior. And what sort of sentence will Judge Dannia Edwards mete out the next time she is faced with a scofflaw, or simply careless, driver who kills a cyclist?
*—I have used a gender-neutral pronoun to eliminate, as much as I can, any biases.
**—If you were expecting me to say something like “a $50 fine” or “two points on the driver’s license,” I understand.
I think my first problem is the story by Paul Walsh of
ReplyDeletethe Star Tribune. He used the term "straying onto the
shoulder". That sounds like the driver was just moseying
around before his car was hit by the cyclist.
Next, it seems like the driver was only charged with driving
without a license. This is at least the eleventh time he has
driven this way. On the second or third time he had committed
a "gross misdemeanor". The punishment could be up to ONE
YEAR in jail plus a $3000 fine.
What in %$#*&!! was the judge thinking?!!