To summarize, John Clayton Dick Jr., 40, and his 12-year-old son, Tyler, were changing a tire on the side of the road.
Then along came Jody Renee Hudson, 38, who was driving with her 9-year-old son. She was going about 66 mph when she plowed into the victims. Both the dad and the son had one of their legs severed.
From the Post article:
I’m sorry, but that woman needs to be locked away for more than 3 years for what she did. What she did was so reckless and should be considered attempted murder.
That little boy will be living in pain with one leg for the rest of his life, while in 3 years, that woman will be back out on the street smoking crack again. I’d bet any amount of money that she’ll be back on the pipe when she gets out. She is a danger to society.
you’ve got a lot of time on your hands today? (ie, two pit threads screeching about ‘oh the humanity, oh the injustice of it all’ based on articles from the Washington Post)
Did you read the article? I mean other than to simply react to the headline. According to the article, she faced four years, got three plus 5 years post release supervision (they call it probation) during which she’ll have to pay restitution (admittedly no amount of $$ can make them whole again).
So the judge did what the prosecutors wanted him to do. You got a gripe about the amount of time, talk to the legislators, they’re the ones to set the sentencing possabilities.
::shrug:: If you add in the prosecution’s request that one year of the 4 yr max be suspended in order to have her also serve five years probation and pay monthly restitution to the family, then she pretty much got the maximum sentence.
Yeah, it’s a tragedy, but I just can’t see the outrage.
Yes she got the max. But I think this is a special case in which the max is not enough. In cases like this where the offense is so reckless, the judge should be able to provide a sentence that fits the crime.
As for the restitution - yeah, like she’ll be able to afford to pay them anything. They’ll never see any more than a few bucks for their loss. That’s a joke.
are you really suggesting that there exists (or should) somewhere, somehow a mechanism by which a judge is allowed to simply toss out the rules of law and say “no, the max is not enough in this case, they should get more”???
In all honesty, that doesn’t matter even one little bit to me, other than the fact that she’ll probably claim she can’t work and get on welfare to avoid having to pay anything to her victims. She is responsible for her own injuries. Too bad, she got hurt cutting the legs off of two people. Boo fucking hoo. For his sake I’m glad her son wasn’t injured (at least it wasn’t mentioned in the article) but the stupid bitch shouldn’t have been smoking crack and driving around with the kid in the car anyway.
Anyone know if that’s the same as drunk driving, or is “impaired by a controlled substance” different? I’m just curious if Crack Smoking Methadone Woman would have gotten a different sentence if she’d been drunk.
Also, $150/month for five years doesn’t sound like much.
Well I feel the same way about mandatory minimums too. It’s all been discussed to death here and everywhere, so I am not the only one who feels that justice should not be run in a one-size-fits-all manner. IMO, that stance is not “heinously ignorant.” What is ignorant, however, is to take all discretion away from judges… if we do, we might as well just have robots for judges.
Anyway my main point is that this woman is most likely still going to be an imminent danger to society when she gets out of jail. Chances are, these are not the last people she will hurt.