A man who fell asleep while driving a chartered bus was
sentenced to 26 years in prison.
Here are the facts from what I could gather:
1) Bus owner turns over bus to guy for him to drive.
2) Bus driver falls asleep during trip resulting in the bus going off the road and overturning. Eleven people die and many others are injured.
3) Bus driver is tested for alcohol and drugs. The results shows he was clean- no drugs or alcohol in his system at the time.
4) Bus driver says he didn't get enough sleep and was driving tired.
5) Driver has a record of past criminal behavior...the last one being convicted of possession of a firearm in 2007 and was on parole.
From this the man is sentenced to 26 years?
I find this sentence thoroughly confusing. Yes, this was a tragic event, and he was negligent in not getting enough sleep, but it was still an
accident.
How can this guy get sentenced to 26 years in prison when you can easily look up numerous cases where people are killed by people convicted of DUI, and get less than a 5 year sentence, if anything?
Should he be held accountable for his actions? Sure. Even serve jail time? If grossly negligent, sure.....but 26 years???
Our justice system is making my head spin. You have convicted murderers
serving far less time.
Is being stupid now a criminal offense subject to maximum penalties? In 2003, a lost hunter in the forest started a signal fire that turned into one of the
worst fires in San Diego history that claimed 15 lives and over 2200 homes. He spent just 6 months in jail and was sentenced to probation and community service. His maximum sentence possible was just 5 years.
I find this sentence mystifying.....does this 26 year sentence for an accident make sense to you? Is this justice, or revenge?
Comments (21)
Definitely some kinda bias going on here.
26 years is way excessive.
That's not justice. That's going way overboard. The poor guy!!! I'm sure he feels horrible enough about it already!!!!!
waaay too damn much...
It certainly is a respectable number considering the circumstances. Considering the Real Politic of the situation he probly got off light. He will have no peace once he is out of prison... Probably a good future AA meeting goer...
26 years........ damn, well i know 11 ppl died because of this and maybe 26 isn't enough for 11 lives.. or maybe its too much for just falling asleep...... but man, there are rapists, child abusers, killers out there that don't even get close to 26 years!
reminds me of a news story from last week.. here in toronto, there's an asian male convenience store owner, being charged for kidnapping. i'm not sure how many year's he's getting.. or days, or what sort of punishment... but its so unfair. he owns a convenience store, saw a guy steal something, so him and another employee chase the guy down the road, caught him, tied his hands together, had him sit and wait til the police come, and the owner and employee's being charged for kdinapping??? i would've done the same thing!
@wenty3208 - The earliest he will be able to get out is when he is 75 (85% of time served), so this may very well be a life sentence.
@Joanna_said_SO - I also find the unevenness of the sentence given compared to other deliberate crimes disturbing.
The case with the convenience store owner and employee is crazy! I hope the judge/jury show common sense with weighing the charge with the guy being caught stealing. What they did should be allowed under "citizen's arrest".
I am certain he will serve his time and be subject to the usual good behavor incentives. God Bless him.
They're trying to build a prison! They're trying to build a prison! For you and me to live in!
~System of the Down
Well that sounds excessive but if it was your or my child we would definitely feel much different.
I would be pissed if it was my kid and he died because some idiot was being stupid. 11 people is a lot of lives.
what are yall talking about?! 26 years is way too little. i say that he shouldv'e gotten 50 years. he just ruined more than 11 lives. what about their families. imagine how they feel if their mom, dad, sis, or bro died because of some stupid buss driver who fell asleep at the wheel of a bus. imagine the sorrow they feel, the horror.
Wha??? It's sad but I don't think that the punishment fits the crime. The bus driver should be charged with negligence and maybe even manslaughter, both which have much lower sentences, I believe.
Through his negligence he killed someone. Several someones. And injured others. I don't have sympathy for him and I think he deserved what he got.
What strikes me as unjust is that the people in the other examples you gave did not get similar or higher sentences. However, that doesn't mean that I think his should be lowered just because the system didn't work when it came to others who killed others either on purpose or through their own negligence.
@tracezilla@lovelyish - Consider this, my friend. In order for a rapist to get somewhere around 26 years, his sentences for multiple rapes would run concurrently. This seldom happens, as plea agreements get made.
Continuing devil's advocate:
I have not heard of a law where falling asleep at the wheel is deemed a criminal offense, save in terms of an OTR trucking license. Since the origin of the deaths was not intentional (that we know of, more on that in a sec), then criminal intent is not existent. This makes anything other than a civil suit seem real senseless.
Now some side points. This is a court case. We are not privy to all the facts, and the jury may not have been allowed some mitigating facts, due to process.
Perhaps he was warned, especially if in written form, or legally ticketed for weaving, etc, due to lack of sleep before accident.
Perhaps his criminal record from the past actually ties in.
To his defense, felony gun possession is easy to have stick to you if you are young and/or ignorant of options. It's also an easy charge to draw. This makes me wonder if he got convicted for it because of what else he was doing. That charge is dismissed/amended easily, if no other criminal activity is involved. Again, sometimes bad luck intervenes, and you get convicted more aggressively than everyone else.
At the end of it all, I feel 26 years is way too much for the case as it superficially is stated. Due to that, I truly believe there is far more than a simple crash with deaths at work here. Something made it very criminal.
@SoloMutt - I took all of that into consideration when I made my comment.
As for the rapist example, I really think that the punishment for rapists should be much higher than it is. I consider the fact that most rapists don't do nearly anywhere near the time they ought to to be a miscarriage of justice. And just because the system fails with a lot of violent offenders (whether they harm someone or kill someone on purpose or by accident) does not mean that I will for one moment think that someone else should get a lighter sentence simply because it is not the norm for another person who commits a similar or worse crime to have such a high sentence.
I sincerely think he got what he deserved. I don't care what else went into it. Anyone who falls asleep at the wheel and not only injures people but kills them should get at least this high of a sentence, as far as I am concerned. And I think it should be even worse for drunk or drugged driving.
I really think its sad that the punishments for similar and worse offenses than this man got for this particular offense. But, just because they are not doesn't mean that I will feel his sentence is uncalled for.
That's just my opinion, though. Sorry if I sounded rude! O.o; It wasn't my intention. Although, I do think I stated this in my reply to the OP.
@tracezilla@lovelyish - Sooo.... you are going to assume that there is no way that he fell asleep due to a freak accident, or apossible undetected medical issue, or maybe low blood sugar? These aren't even the good reasons I could come up with if I bothered to research. What if he actually was victimized by someone playing a crude prank at a restaurant, mixing things into food or drink.
Falling asleep at the wheel is a SYMPTOM, not a root cause. What made him fail to remain awake? Is the article stating with 100% certainty that he knowingly put himself in this position?
Ruining this man's life for one mistake seems a bit extreme. I suppose it's easy to take your position when it does not affect you.
@SoloMutt - I think that you're misunderstanding what I'm saying.
I'm not saying that he did it on purpose. I'm not saying that he did not do it on purpose. I'm not ruling anything out. I just think that the end result of what happened justifies the sentence that he was given, even if it IS unprecedented.
And if I were in his shoes, I would certainly be very upset and very afraid, but I would have to admit (at least to myself, even if I couldn't bring myself to say it out loud and admit it that way) that I had it coming for causing the deaths of 11 people, even if I did not mean to do it.
I never once said that I thought he did it on purpose.
@tracezilla@lovelyish - Do you undrstand how totally idiotic that sounds? My friend got stung by a bee while driving. He was highly allergic. The car was careening all over the place. None of the rest of us would wish ill upon him for something being his control.
I suggest you stop right now, and reconsider your position. Stating that even if someone should be treated as if willfully negligent whether actually being so is a terrible idea. This can be expanded to a logical conclusion that a tanker truck driver that avoids a deaf old lady, but unsuccessfully recovers and destroys a house with 2 people in it is guilty of double homicide.
Please reconsider. we don't need any idealistic approach taken to that extreme. Your solution would add another ruined life unnecesarily.
@SoloMutt - I guess we are just going to have to disagree on this. But, thank you for being polite in your responses to me. A lot of people aren't very polite, these days, when it comes to disagreements with others.
Though we disagree, I do have an appreciation for your conviction. This seems a pretty important viewpoint matter, so I do hope that life springs some unharmful wisdom on one of us. I will never be too old to learn that I am wrong on something and make a correction. Should I find your view to bethe more valid, I will step right beside you in it's defense.
I cannot see a path to agreement. Time's cleared a lot of misty roads for me, so ya never know.....