Girl gets 30 days for drunken-driving death of woman/mother/wife

[ducatiz]

This is nauseating

Article

17 year old girl gets hammered, drives, and kills this lady, but isn't charged as an adult because she is "immature."

It's disgusting.  She should be in jail for life.  if you don't know by age 17 that you don't drink and get in a car, then you don't deserve to be free.

Teen Who Drove Drunk Gets 30 Days for Fatality

By Bill Brubaker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 30, 2008; B01

A 17-year-old Fairfax County girl who pleaded guilty in a drunken-driving crash that killed a Leesburg woman was sentenced yesterday to 30 days in a juvenile detention center and ordered to do 500 hours of community service.

Loudoun County juvenile court Judge Pamela L. Brooks suspended the most punitive part of the sentence, which called for the teenager to be detained until September 2011, when she turns 21. Brooks also revoked the girl's driver's license and ordered her to get a job to pay $5,000 in funeral expenses to the victim's family.

The teenager was sent to Loudoun's detention center April 21 after she pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter. Brooks did not give her any credit for the 38 days she has served.

Kathleen Becker, 59, died instantly the night of Sept. 20 when her van was hit head-on by the teenager's sport-utility vehicle. Becker was returning home from choir practice at a Catholic church in Sterling.

The teenager had been "binge drinking" before and during a football game at Westfield High School, where she was a senior, authorities said. She had left the game in Chantilly drunk and ended up on Route 15 in Loudoun. She had a blood-alcohol level of 0.17, more than twice the 0.08 legal limit for adults under Virginia law, after the crash.

"My options, quite frankly, are not options I am happy with. . . . Frankly, I don't think 30 days is long enough. I don't think 60 days is long enough," Brooks told the teenager, who was shackled around her ankles and dressed in a green detention-center outfit.

Brooks said a state pre-sentencing report concluded that the girl was "not an appropriate candidate" to be sent to a Virginia Department of Juvenile Justice detention facility.

"You are a convicted felon, so you are a criminal," Brooks told the girl, a first-time offender. "But I would not classify you as a hardened criminal."

The Washington Post generally does not name juveniles charged with crimes unless they are charged as adults.

Becker's daughter, Sharon Macielinski, said her family did not want the girl to be locked up for a long period. The teenager will be on supervised probation until she is 21.

In an interview Wednesday, Macielinski said: "We're not looking out for revenge or payback or anything like that. We're looking at: What is best for rehabilitating this individual so other people don't get hurt?"

Yesterday, Loudoun Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Adriana Eberle urged Brooks to hand down a sentence that would deter other teens from drinking. "This is bigger than what is going on inside this courtroom. . . . She should not get the same punishment as a juvenile who commits a grand larceny," she said.

The victim's husband, Henry Becker, asked Brooks to order the girl to pay half of the funeral expenses, which totaled $10,000, from her earnings.

Sobbing, the teenager apologized to Becker's family. "I can't explain how devastated I have been. . . . I can't forgive myself for taking another human life," she said, reading from a statement.

Outside the courtroom, her attorney, Peter D. Greenspun, called the sentence "fair and responsible and appropriate."

Asked where his client obtained the alcohol, Greenspun said: "It came from different sources. Kids get alcohol. There's nothing unique about that. They get it from adults. They get it by stealing. They get it with fake IDs. They get it by 'shoulder tapping,' where they tap an adult going into a 7-Eleven on the shoulder and ask if they can buy them some alcohol."

On the night of the crash, he said, "there was a lot of energy" at Westfield High because its football team was playing rival Chantilly."

"There was a group of kids there who were partying and drinking before the game," he said. "And apparently there were adults who were tailgating at the school and drinking."

Kathleen Becker was a school crossing guard in the 1970s and 1980s at Sterling Elementary School. In recent years, she did volunteer work but spent most of her time caring for a teenage son who has a genetic disorder.

Prosecutors had wanted to try the teenager as an adult. But they were turned down by a Circuit Court judge who ruled that the girl was emotionally and socially immature, had no previous criminal record and had demonstrated "excellence" in school.

Yesterday, Brooks made a prediction before sending the teenager back to the detention center in Leesburg.

"I think this is something that's going to eat at you for a long time," she said.

[Ducatiloo]

 Sobbing, the teenager apologized to Becker's family. "I can't explain how devastated I have been

How do you think the family of that Woman you murdered felt you B**ch? 
It hate Judges that do this!  I didn't get out of my last ticket because I demonstrated "excellence" in school.

[SKOM]

Tragic Story.

The family did say that they don't want her to be locked up for a long time though.   

[Pakhan]

It hate Judges that do this!

"My options, quite frankly, are not options I am happy with. . . . Frankly, I don't think 30 days is long enough. I don't think 60 days is long enough," Brooks told the teenager, who was shackled around her ankles and dressed in a green detention-center outfit.

Brooks said a state pre-sentencing report concluded that the girl was "not an appropriate candidate" to be sent to a Virginia Department of Juvenile Justice detention facility.

I don't think she got enough of a punishment, but at the same time when sentencing someone that young you have to be careful not to turn them into a criminal for life by totally ruining their prospect of being a positive contributing member of society.

I think 60 days in jail, she should have to do community service till she is 21, lose her drivers license till 21, and be on probation till 21.  I dunno, maybe that's not the best way to go. 

[Ducatiloo]

Tragic Story.

The family did say that they don't want her to be locked up for a long time though.   

And I knew a kid that didn't want the kids that pushed him down in the sandbox to be punished.
Sometimes you can't kill someone with kindness.  To me I dont think this is even a short time, but if it brings closure to the family
that that is what counts.

[junior varsity]

what a piece of shit. she should be in prison till she's 21 at the minimum and have her wages garnished for life. FOR LIFE. Every employer and her future spouse should know what kind of an idiot they are dealing with.

"OMG! LIKE HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL IS LIKE SO TOTALLY RAD! LETS DRINK A TON OF WINE COOLERS AND BEAT THOSE KIDS FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF TOWN, WHOOOO!"

And excellence my ass, she probably had a B average, would have gone to college, drunk herself into failing out (she is obviously not so good at decision making) and we'd be saying golly, she had potential, her high school report card said so...

[tommys67]

"Becker's daughter, Sharon Macielinski, said her family did not want the girl to be locked up for a long period. "

The family likely "forgave" her for the accident.

Bullshit.   

That little princess deserved hard time.

[SacDuc]

Spoooooooon.

[Popeye the Sailor]

I'm guessing none of you have ever had one too many and drove home?


How about let a friend do the same?

[Ducatiloo]

I'm guessing none of you have ever had one too many and drove home?


How about let a friend do the same?

Nope and Nope and with what she blew she had more than one to many.  She should get 1 year for each .001 she blew.

[DCXCV]

I know I've done stupid things in my life that by pure chance haven't had detrimental effects on others.  If I ever killed someone by a stupid action I'd never let myself forget it.  

I'd rather have this girl supported by her family and her own labor than tax dollars if her brain is doling out the punishment on her already.  Don't know if it is, but if she has half a conscience it will be.

[Pakhan]

I'm guessing none of you have ever had one too many and drove home?


How about let a friend do the same?

Yes, but they didn't murder anyone on the way.

[junior varsity]

HELL NO I DID NOT DRINK AND DRIVE BEFORE I WAS 18!  (Or after for that matter)

Its not that hard to figure out not to do it regardless of what age you are.

Shit, when I was in college, my fraternity (you know, the groups the media labels alcoholics) had sense enough to have a 'Dry Brother' program. A specific few guys assigned each night when any partying was going on and also every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday nights to be the on-call sober drivers.

Nobody wanted to make it into the headlines as the guys who were idiots and killed a mother on her way home from choir practice.

[Scooter Montgomery]

I'm guessing none of you have ever had one too many and drove home?


How about let a friend do the same?

I think if you are 17 and underage drunk driving, you should get some hard time and maybe even a spoon. How many commericals are on tv about stopping underage drinking? A lot around here. Here is a good time to set up a sweet example to the future underage drinkers of what can happen if you drink under age. 30 days is really not a good example, unless your Morgan Spurlock.

[Ducatiloo]

HELL NO I DID NOT DRINK AND DRIVE BEFORE I WAS 18!  (Or after for that matter)

Its not that hard to figure out not to do it regardless of what age you are.

Shit, when I was in college, my fraternity (you know, the groups the media labels alcoholics) had sense enough to have a 'Dry Brother' program. A specific few guys assigned each night when any partying was going on and also every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday nights to be the on-call sober drivers.

Nobody wanted to make it into the headlines as the guys who were idiots and killed a mother on her way home from choir practice.

+1 on that, this is really not a hard concept.   Sure she may feel bad, but she won't feel as bad as the Woman that was killed by her feels Dead.
10, 15, 35 years from now that girl will feel better, but Dead is Dead.