quote:

Originally posted by pulicords:

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
^^^^
I had the same thought when I heard the sentence announced.

I'm a tough on crime supporter, and there is no doubt that this man is guilty and was negligent and serious punishment is called for.. but when I think of other incidents involving death and destruction that were committed willfully and intentionally that resulted in either lighter sentences or probation, and considering the examples you give, it seems this man's sentence is excessive.

We had another recent sentence in which a BLM activist shot a motorist in the back of the head, the man survived but with serious permanent impairment. The shooter is a defense attorney and received a plea deal in which all charges related to the shooting were dropped, and instead agreed to plead guilty to tampering with a dead body, and received an 11 year sentence that will likely be reduced by half.

I believe there is a real disparity in how similar crimes are treated in various parts of this country.

I think the widespread media coverage of the crash fanned the flames of public outrage, although apparently sentencing minimums played a part as well.

There is a petition being circulated calling for this truck driver's sentence to be reduced.

Mandatory minimum sentences exist because the electorate doesn't want prosecutors offering light sentences to serious offenders in exchange for guilty pleas and/or judges doing the same thing. Those decrying the disparity between jurisdictions usually are "progressives" upset when convicted offenders are given serious sentences, not so much when they get probation, home detention, or a short period of incarceration. Capital Punishment? It's a "disparity" when one state has it and others don't! In some jurisdictions killing multiple victims doesn't result in more time than killing "only" one innocent person. Are you suggesting that every jurisdiction meet that "standard"?

In Los Angeles County, the current District Attorney was elected because his campaign coffers were increased enormously through funding by George Soros based organizations. Talk about "disparities"! The death penalty (approved by CA voters repeatedly) is off the table, minors are NEVER charged as adults even if they committed multiple serious felonies (such as gang related murders, rapes, robberies, assaults, etc...) and are virtually assured release at age 25, when they're outside the jurisdiction of the juvenile court.

In this case, the electorate of Colorado determined that gross negligence of this level that took the lives of these victims, subjected their family and other loved ones to this trauma and loss, and deprived them of so much, required a measure of justice that you deem inappropriate so easily because you weren't directly effected. The public had every right to be outraged and potential future offenders should damn well take this as a learning moment. If they get behind the wheel of a multi-ton vehicle, they're responsible for what it can do to others. That means they need to always keep it in proper working order and under their control. There's no way to quantitatively demonstrate how many lives are saved by sending this message, but how does that differ from punishing those who commit murder, robbery, rape, burglary of residences, etc...?

Saying you're a "tough on crime supporter" doesn't mean a thing when your suggestion that a national sentencing standard is somehow appropriate. Who's "standards" will be applied? Those in the jurisdiction where multiple fatalities are caused due to gross negligence and murders inflicted by the "worst of the worst" result in punishment deemed appropriate by local voters or "Progressive" policies set in places like Los Angeles and San Francisco, where the criminal is viewed as a "victim" of societal "inequities"?

I'm sure the petition you're referring to will get lots of signatures from people that don't live in the area where these deaths occurred, weren't effected personally, and aren't educated to the details of the crime, like locals were. The "widespread media coverage" never got to those signing it, but a sanitized version of the story (painting the offender as a victim of judicial oppression) will. "Flames of public outrage" can also be fanned by disinformation on the part of those pushing a pro-offender agenda too and have been for decades. That alone is a good reason why local offenders should be dealt with by the people that live in the general area where the crime(s) occurred. They are vested in the safety of their community, the people living in places like New York City (a great place to circulate such a petition) aren't.

pulicords, when I browse the forum I generally stop to read your comments, as I find them reasonable and of some value, and at least worth considering. Having said that, you do yourself no credit by making accusations not in evidence. I would've thought that a former LEO would know better than to jump to conclusions.

Re-read my comments carefully. No where did I call for eliminating mandatory sentence minimums or imposing federal sentences...I merely pointed out that per the article I posted they were reported as a factor in the harsh sentence handed down. As a matter of fact, if the (poorly worded) article is accurate, the judge handed down the minimum of the mandatory sentence range.

My previous comments in this thread, as well as comments in other threads should leave no doubt as to where I stand, but for any who might read my comments, let me state, categorically, this young truck driver was found guilty of multiple counts of negligence resulting in death, injuries, and destruction of property by a jury of his peers and deserves serious prison time.

Unlike many (not all) who signed his petition, I don't believe he should have his sentence commuted and certainly doesn't deserve a full pardon.

The U.S. legal system differentiates between willful intentional acts of crime, and crimes of negligence, with lesser crimes receiving lesser punishments. By all the accounts that I'm aware of, as deadly, injurious, and destructive as this crash was, it happened quickly without premeditation...so, negligence.

Context is important. You quoted one local incident in my comments, about a local shooting in which a Black Lives Matter protester, who was a defense attorney, intentionally shot an unarmed passing motorist in the back of the head. The victim survived, but endured a lengthy rehab process and will suffer serious permanent impairment. In that case, the DA dropped every single serious charge related to the shooting, including the weapons charges, because they carried sentence enhancers that would have significantly increased the convicted defendant's sentence, and instead replaced the charges with an "equal" charge that didn't carry any sentence enhancers and will likely result in his 11 year sentence being cut in half. The judge in this case noted that "a good man did a bad thing" as his justification for accepting the lesser charges plea deal.

Barring evidence to the contrary, everything I've read indicates that this truck driver was a "good man" too.

Riots in America page 316

In another thread I posted an article in which a
defense contractor intentionally falsified strength data for steel used in U.S. Navy submarines. In this case, the contractor faces a maximum sentence of 10 years + fines.

Washington state former foundry director that produces steel used in U.S. submarines pleads guilty to falsifying strength data

As you point out, there are countless examples of juveniles who commit serious intentional crimes, including crimes that result in death, and yet they are sentenced to diversion programs... ie the girls in D.C. that attempted to steal a delivery driver's car and as he tried to stop them there was a crash resulting in his death.

There is a current thread in the pistol section about a youth who got hold of a LEO's gun while he wasn't present and accidentally negligently shot a friend...and was sentenced to a diversion program.

It remains to be seen what sentences and punishments will result in the shooting on the movie set of Rust, but negligence will most likely be found in this case...and quite possibly by several individuals and entities.

Colorado's Democrat Governor, Democrat Secretary of State, Democrat AG, and Democrat controlled legislature were busy passing legislation to reduce sentences and release criminals before the pandemic, and once the pandemic hit, both the legislature and Governor/ Health Department seized the crisis opportunity and issued mandates releasing thousands of convicted criminals, many of them violent. I'll be posting a separate thread soon detailing how serious crime in Colorado has spiked recently, with many violent criminals either released on PR or simply released from the prisons they were in, only to commit more serious crimes...so, defendants who commit serious crimes given PR or light sentences, convicted violent criminals who committed intentional crimes were released early under the guise of 'health' or 'social justice'...and a young man sentenced to 110 years for a crime of negligence. .

I stand by my statement; there is disparity in how the same or similar crime is punished in various parts of the U.S., and in the case of the BLM shooter I mentioned above, two different judges and DAs in the same state, one pair felt obliged to follow mandatory sentencing minimums in the negligent crash, while the other pair simply dropped the charges of an intentional shooting crime and replaced them with others to avoid sentence enhancers.

True enough, some of the examples I've listed resulted in death, while others did not, but had the potential for death or injury.

No. I don't want (or trust) the federal government to mandate sentences for crimes charged by states. I'm simply pointing out (and maybe even lamenting) that there exists significant disparities in how the same or similar crimes are punished in different parts of the U.S., if they are even punished at all.

I don't blame the jury for this truck driver's sentence. They considered the evidence presented and determined that he was guilty, but they didn't hand down his sentence. I don't know how much discretion the judge had in this case, but I'll even cut him some slack and assume he followed state statutes as he understood them.

No. I blame legislatures for, often, poorly written poorly conceived laws that have less to do with delivering equality and consistency in justice, and more to do with politics and implementing social reforms that will help to retain their elected seats and stay in power.

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes is reported to have once told a lawyer in his court "this is a court of law young man, not a court of justice". The courts are supposed to deliver verdicts in accordance with the law...but it is the legislature that is supposed to conduct deliberative debate and write the laws that will ultimately deliver justice to it's citizens.

Intentional willful criminal acts vs. crimes of negligence.

quote:

Originally posted by slabside45:
46and2, I'm reading your statement to be a literal belief that the 110 year sentence is 5x too much. So then do you believe that a sentence 1/5 that amount (or 22 years) is appropriate, given that he will serve 20% of the time as a non violent offender? That would be around 4 1/2 years, if my public school math holds up.

I'm not much into worrying about what the number of years is that an offender is sentenced to, so much as how many of them they actually serve relative to the crime. I don't necessarily think that a sub-five year stint is sufficient (in my book) for hitting and killing four people with an 18 wheeler. Maybe I'm not seeing something you are seeing?

You make a good point. I would like to see more consistency in how similar/ same crimes are punished and sentences handed down, but ultimately I'm interested in whether the time served fits the crime.

In my mind, 25-35 years of actual time served, with perhaps a slight reduction for good behavior would be appropriate in this case.

I'd like to see this 26 year old man make it out of the joint while he is still young enough to take what he has learned from this tragedy and still be able to live a productive life, while applying those lessons learned.

Others have survived tragedy and done productive things with their experience. It might just be worth giving this young guy a slight sentence reduction just so that when he gets out he could give talks to young student drivers, or perhaps even young truck drivers just starting their careers, and use his experience to emphasize safe driving to them.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Modern Day Savage,

There's been a whole lot of words on this topic

Woodman predicts he'll do 12-to-20, mostly in minimum security. Teaching . . . wait for it . . . truck operations safety.

God rest the souls of this horrific and preventable accident.

American Thinker essay

Colorado D.A. celebrates with grotesque 'trophy' after trucker whose brakes failed sentenced to 110 years in prison

I just found out a few days ago the driver declined plea deal negotiations and said the convictions recognize harm caused to crash victims. Turned out that was yet another bad move for this guy.

quote:

Originally posted by wishfull thinker:
American Thinker essay

Colorado D.A. celebrates with grotesque 'trophy' after trucker whose brakes failed sentenced to 110 years in prison

That writer should work for Pravda:

quote:

Rogel Aguilera-Mederos's 2019 accident was attributed not to the failure of his brakes, but entirely to a failure in his judgment over whether he could take an off ramp (try doing that without brakes in a state of panic). As a result, the poor Cuban immigrant with no criminal record got a de facto death sentence for an accident he had never intended to commit, was largely powerless to prevent, and fully cooperated with the authorities.

At his sentencing, the man cried at his lost life as the monster sentence was read, looking powerless and small against a huge state juggernaut — a young, humble immigrant trying to provide for his family with a dirty, dangerous, low-paid job nobody wants in a profession blue states treat like dirt. Nothing pointed to the power of the elites, the unequalness of the justice system, or the mercilessness of the ambitious prosecutors with their unlimited prosecutorial "discretion" than that case. The man was expendable to them, and they had careers to advance, so they got busy.

Not very biased or objective. . .

^^^ Well, it's an editorial.

Judge to reconsider trucker's 110-year prison sentence

A judge has scheduled a resentencing hearing for Rogel Aguilera-Mederos, the truck driver sentenced to 110 years in prison for a 2019 crash that left four dead and several others injured near Denver.

Aguilera-Mederos, 26, was convicted of 27 charges, including vehicular homicide. Under minimum sentencing laws, he was sentenced to 110 years in prison. Nearly five million people have signed a petition calling on Colorado Governor Jared Polis to grant clemency for Aguilera-Mederos.

Alexis King, the district attorney in Jefferson County, made the request for the hearing on Monday and asked the judge to lower the sentence to 20 to 30 years.

https://news.yahoo.com/judge-s...ckers-195646525.html

The constant "but his braked failed" mantra is getting very annoying.

He failed to properly drive an 80,000 lb loaded truck safely down a long grade. As explained by experienced drivers earlier in the thread, this requires proper gear selection and appropriate use of the engine compression brake to keep speed down. He completely failed to do this, passed up multiple runaway ramps, and didn't ditch the truck off the road before hitting stopped traffic and killing multiple people.

He CAUSED his wheel brakes to fail by burning them up when he failed to do the above.

Reminds me of an idiot I know who lives in Ohio. He took a trip to the rocky mountains and asked afterwards how you go down all those grades without wearing out your brakes quickly. Multiple people told him he should have downshifted to engine brake.

"What's that?"

Select a lower gear and let the engine revs slow you down.

"But it's an automatic, it doesn't have gears"

PRNDL - SELECT L

"Oh, is that what that's for?"

Yes.

Now, diesel engines do not work like this since they are fuel controlled and not throttle controlled. Lifting the pedal and downshifting will not slow you down, which is why Clessie Cummins invented the Jacobs or "Jake" Compression Brake. Yes, that was him, after perfecting the 4-stroke diesel while most others were 2-stroke, and perfecting injection pumps that made it all work.

But it's essentially the same issue - you cannot use wheel brakes to control speed on long downhill grades.

It is my observation that sentencing guidelines and mandatory minimum sentences are imposed by the lege for two reasons. One is when judges use discretion and impose sentences that are thought by an outraged public to be too low in certain cases. The second is when when prosecutors make deals for sentences that are perceived to be too low, which are then approved by judges. (Many judges are reluctant to upset prosecutor deals because this cripples prosecutors trying to make deals. Also, the courts are generally very overcrowded, and if they don't make deals, very few cases would get disposed of.)

I don't think sentencing guidelines are ever imposed by the lege because sentences are too long.

Whether these sentencing guideline laws are a good idea, on the whole, is hard to evaluate.

When what is thought to be a too light sentence is imposed, everyone howls. And when a too heavy sentence is imposed, everyone howls. I do know that basing overall policy on a few high profile cases is almost certainly not a good idea. Making policy decisions in response to the extremes will usually not solve a problem. There is an old maxim in the law that says, "hard cases make bad law."

This guy did make a horrible mistake, and a mistake that a fact finder found was criminally culpable. The sentence does seem harsh in light of the fact that the driver made what was a reckless or negligent mistake, as opposed to a conscious decision to do evil. This case, to me, highlights a problem with mandatory minimums.

^^^ As long as we have politicians that react to "mob outrage" and feel the need to "do something" this will continue to happen.

Does anyone know why these particular mandatory minimums were enacted? Criminally negligent vehicular homicide (or whatever the actual charge was) would seem to be something that would be applied to drunk drivers.

Playing devils advocate ??? Granted the truck driver committed multible driver errors and several people died as well as large monatary dollars damages in physical and medical expenses . And with the mandatory sentences that some how will send some people to jail for life sentences that in other states do not come to this level.... What about those people that lost family members that died or seriously injured ??? Should they not be compensated for their loss and justice for those injured or property damage!! Sometimes Lady Justice takes off her blindfold and her vision becomes jaded. This case to me seems to be a more "knee jerk" reaction than actual justice. .......................................... drill sgt.

I think it is a little challenging for most folks to make sense of because apparently 110 years doesn’t mean 110 years but rather 22 years, and possibly with some time off that for good behavior.

Before seeing Jones post about the violations being not considered violent dividing the sentence by five, I thought “110 years sounds like a long time. Still, it was a big screwup, and while personal responsibility doesn’t seem to be a thing anymore, maybe it should be.”

I guess I think it would be better if punishments were more consistent across the country, but I certainly wouldn’t want the Feds setting them, nor would I want the standards set by most CA cities, Portland, Seattle, or any other places that has a Soros bought & paid for DA. I’d like to see more personal responsibility, not less.

I still haven’t heard if Colorado has a de facto cap on sentences. For example, in my state a judge can throw the proverbial book at someone but unless a charge carries a lifetime sentence (5-life for example), the maximum amount of time a person will serve by statue is 30 years.

An example would be this, John/Jane Does is sentenced to ten 1-15 consecutive sentences. Technically it appears they have a sentence of 150 years. By statute, the sentence is capped at 30 years.

Are there any Colorado attorneys who have looked at the charges and the sentence? And does Colorado have anything like my state?

quote:

Originally posted by slosig:
I think it is a little challenging for most folks to make sense of because apparently 110 years doesn’t mean 110 years but rather 22 years, and possibly with some time off that for good behavior.

Before seeing Jones post about the violations being not considered violent dividing the sentence by five, I thought “110 years sounds like a long time. Still, it was a big screwup, and while personal responsibility doesn’t seem to be a thing anymore, maybe it should be.”

I guess I think it would be better if punishments were more consistent across the country, but I certainly wouldn’t want the Feds setting them, nor would I want the standards set by most CA cities, Portland, Seattle, or any other places that has a Soros bought & paid for DA. I’d like to see more personal responsibility, not less.

I don't understand how time sentenced vs time served, but 15+ years in jail seems reasonable to me. The guy fucked up, he wasn't trying to harm anyone, that has to count for something. Especially since murder, rape, other purposeful horrible crimes get seemingly tiny sentences.

And that's another problem. Someone gets sentenced for 20 years, but serves 5-10 and is out on parole. Or in this case sentenced to 110 but out in 22. So you have to give them longer sentences to make them actually serve the time.

It's like telling your chronically late friend that something starts an hour earlier so when they are an hour late they are actually on time. That is, until they get wind of it and start arriving two hours late, so you tell them it starts two hours early, and so on until you are telling them 12 hours in advance.

How about people just serve the sentence given by the judge without all this sentence inflation? The judge may stipulate an opportunity for parole after some of the time is served, contingent on good behavior. But it's all spelled out at sentencing and there no exceptions UNLESS the judge grants it.

I do like what the Feds do on sentencing. If you are sentenced to 20 years, you serve 20 years, with the possibility of a small, fixed credit for good behavior. That credit is a matter of months, though.

I do not approve of having parole boards that can let people out early, with relatively loose standards for how they do it. Those parole decisions are one reason that initial sentences are so high. If a judge or jury wants the person to do 20 years for sure, they have to sentence them to 40 years.

quote:

Originally posted by jhe888:
I do like what the Feds do on sentencing. If you are sentenced to 20 years, you serve 20 years, with the possibility of a small, fixed credit for good behavior. That credit is a matter of months, though.

I do not approve of having parole boards that can let people out early, with relatively loose standards for how they do it. Those parole decisions are one reason that initial sentences are so high. If a judge or jury wants the person to do 20 years for sure, they have to sentence them to 40 years.

Every bit of this.

I asked early on for those who found 22 or so years to serve being so obscene that it shook their morality to give me a number of actual years served that would be fair.

Crickets.

Why? Because the real answer is they believe the answer is “0” but they don’t have the courage to say it out loud. They want to be social justice warriors and vacate the actual juries recommendation for their own personal beliefs. Whatever they may be.

And they pile on this false narrative that ROUTINELY they are rapists and murders that are getting sentenced to less than 20 to serve. But, their arguments are void. They are saying stuff that equates to “a shotgun is better than a potato for breaching, so purple is the new virus”.

Show me instances where 4 rapes, 4 murders, 4 violent robberies got less than 22 years to serve. No doubt they are out there, but they are few and far between even in liberal cities.

This guy killed 4 people and injured a dozen more. The jury heard the evidence and he got the minimums more or less that will cause him to give 5.5 or so years for each life he took. More than fair.

Truck driver's sentence lowered to 10 years after originally receiving 110 years for fatal crash

A truck driver who was sentenced to 110 years in prison for a fatal accident in Colorado has been resentenced to 10 years after an outcry from family and advocates.

Gov. Jared Polis announced the commutation of Rogel Aguilera-Mederos' sentence Thursday.

"I am writing to inform you that I am granting your application for a commutation," Polis wrote. "After learning about the highly atypical and unjust sentence in your case, I am commuting your sentence to 10 years and granting you parole eligibility on December 30, 2026."

https://www.yahoo.com/gma/truc...ed-10-231212889.html

10 years for killing 4 people and maiming several others.

People have received stiffer sentences for marijuana possession.

Disgusting.

As I said before - all because people who know FUCK-ALL about diesel tractor rigs believed the "but my brakes failed!" bullshit.

"How can you punish this driver for a mechanical failure that wasn't his fault?" Which is no different than "I didn't pull the trigger and the gun just went off" excuse.

This moron is no different than a pilot that crashed on landing because they "forgot" to set the flaps, "forgot" to deploy the landing gear, and "forgot" to use the thrust reversers, then says "I pressed the brake pedal and it didn't work!"

There is incompetence, then there is negligence, and then there is gross negligence. And this idiot raised it exponentially. The charge and sentence should be roughly the same as someone engaging in street racing at highly illegal speeds that crashes into innocent people and causes their death.