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Hate drunk drivers, but I'm torn over this...

Discussion in 'Anything goes' started by Killick, Aug 13, 2007.

  1. Killick

    Killick Well-Known Member

    Smacks of double jeopardy. Also of election year grand-standing. But I'm torn. Eighteen months seems like a pittance for a DUI accident that had some causal relationship to the kid's death. BUT, eight years later? After he's already done time for the accident?

    What sayeth SportsJournalists.com?
     
  2. FileNotFound

    FileNotFound Well-Known Member

    Tough call. I'm leaning toward "election-year grandstanding," but I hate myself for thinking that.
     
  3. Cadet

    Cadet Guest

    Nope, stick him back in jail. He caused the kid's death, not to mention years of suffering.
     
  4. Armchair_QB

    Armchair_QB Well-Known Member

    It's double jeopardy AND political grandstanding. I'd be shocked if this held up in court.

    What if the driver hadn't been drunk but had run a red light because he was in a hurry? Should he go to jail again?

    18 months wasn't enough to begin with however.
     
  5. Flash

    Flash Guest

    Double jeopardy ... he has done his time.
     
  6. zeke12

    zeke12 Guest

    It's clearly double jeopardy.

    He's been convicted on a charge related to the incident, you can't go back and change it now.

    Wanting our institutions of law to, you know, follow the law doesn't mean you favor drunk driving.
     
  7. bigpern23

    bigpern23 Well-Known Member

    Election-year grandstanding.

    I hate what that guy did to the kid and his family, but he was charged, tried, sentenced and served his time. He's done. He ran the course of the justice system.

    I have a friend who got a DUI back in 2004 and lost his license for three months (amonth other penalties). I have another friend who got one in February after new laws were enacted and he got a six-month suspension. Should the guy who got one in 2004 and served it out now have his license taken away for three more months? Are we going to do this with everyone who got off with three months before the penalties were stiffened?

    People can't go back and start looking to retroactively apply newer, stiffer punishments because society's standards have changed. If that's going to be the case, the line for harsher punishments starts behind the lynching victims whose attackers saw no jail time.
     
  8. Football_Bat

    Football_Bat Well-Known Member

    Not only are there double jeopardy concerns, there are ex post facto considerations as well.

    Therefore, he will get the retroactive five years, get credit for the 18 months served, and likely be paroled in less than a year.

    If the guy's cleaned up, he may only be sentenced to time served.
     
  9. Cadet

    Cadet Guest

    Where are the board lawyers? There is no double jeopardy because he was likely charged with DUI and causing great bodily harm before; now the charge will be vehicular homicide. New charges, no double jeopardy.
     
  10. zeke12

    zeke12 Guest

    Nope.

    You can't be tried for an act, convicted of it, and then later charged differently for the same act.

    It's the rules. Simply changing the charge doesn't play.

    It's why when someone is charged with first-degree murder, they are often also charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter. The jury can dismiss on two and pick the one they want. But once you've tried someone for murder, and they're acquitted, there's no going back and charging him with manslaughter.
     
  11. bigpern23

    bigpern23 Well-Known Member

    I don't think that's correct. I believe all charges related to an incident must be tried at the same time. I might be wrong, but I don't think you can go back and add charges to a crime after it has gone through the courts.

    A charge can be changed, from say aggravated assault and battery to manslaughter, if the victim dies before or during the trial, but once the case is tried for that particular incident, I'm pretty sure you can't be charged for anything else relating to it.

    EDIT: Zeke beat me to it and said it better.
     
  12. Killick

    Killick Well-Known Member

    Well, not that it changes the legal arguments any, but someone just e-mailed me and said Cleveland station is reporting the guy was picked up on another DUI in early December. Ugh.
    Finger is poised hovering over the Starman button.
     
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