Felony hit and run (Procedure questions)

MostWanted

MostWanted

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https://abc11.com/driver-charged-in-hit-and-run-that-killed-cary-woman-walking-dogs/6887941/

This happened about a mile from my house around 6:45 this morning. Sunrise was about 7:17 with a heavy overcast. Woman was wearing a reflective vest and walking two dogs. Driver says he thought he hit a deer so he didn't stop, but saw it on the news midday and called 911 to say he was the driver of the truck. He's charged with felony hit and run. It's a terrible tragedy. But I have some questions for those of you who know your way around the courthouse.

  • I looked up the elements of felony H&R and they are all obviously met in this case except for the requirement that the DA prove he knew, or should have known, that he had hit someone. He claims he thought it was a deer, which seems credible, especially at twilight. I suppose that means that the investigation produced evidence that showed he knew (or should have known) it wasn't a deer?
  • Who would have made the decision to charge him? Investigating agency or the DA?
  • This was a Class F felony. Will he lose his guns if convicted? Is that permanent?
  • He bonded out this afternoon. Will the Sheriff come to his home now and collect his guns because a felony charge is pending?
 
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MostWanted said:
https://abc11.com/driver-charged-in-hit-and-run-that-killed-cary-woman-walking-dogs/6887941/

This happened about a mile from my house around 6:45 this morning. Sunrise was about 7:17 with a heavy overcast. Woman was wearing a reflective vest and walking two dogs. Driver says he thought he hit a deer so he didn't stop, but saw it on the news midday and called 911 to say he was the driver of the truck. He's charged with felony hit and run. It's a terrible tragedy. But I have some questions for those of you who know your way around the courthouse.

  • I looked up the elements of felony H&R and they are all obviously met in this case except for the requirement that the DA prove he knew, or should have known, that he had hit someone. He claims he thought it was a deer, which seems credible, especially at twilight. I suppose that means that the investigation produced evidence that showed he knew (or should have known) it wasn't a deer?
  • Who would have made the decision to charge him? Investigating agency or the DA?
  • This was a Class F felony. Will he lose his guns if convicted? Is that permanent?
  • He bonded out this afternoon. Will the Sheriff come to his home now and collect his guns because a felony charge is pending?
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Without knowing all the details of the case I cannot speak as to how they determined he knew or should have known he hit a person instead of a deer. For changes to be filed, some type of evidence must have been present. Remember charges are based upon probable cause, not on evidence beyond the shadow of a doubt, which means the defendant may be found not guilty or the charges lessened at some point during the proceedings.

The decision could have been made by either the investigating agency or the DA's Office. Based upon the time frame from the incident to charges I would guess it was the investigating agency, and this is only a guess on my part.

Any felony conviction will result in a loss of the right to possess firearms, it is not dependant upon the class only that it is a felony.

Yes, it is permanent. There are cases of individuals being convicted of non-violent felonies at a young age, who changed behavior, led productive lives afterward, and got their records expunged years later which allowed them to possess firearms again. There are a few other situations but they require the financial ability to retain attorneys with expertise in those areas. None of the listed above are guaranteed to be successful for a felon to have the ability to possess firearms again.

No the Sheriff nor will any sheriff deputies will come to their house and seize any guns, because they are not a convicted felon. The only exception which allows firearms to be seized in a pre-conviction felony case is in domestic violence cases, and those cases require a court order from a judge which is based upon information furnished under oath by the victim that the defendant presents a danger to the victim or the victims family. The seizure of any firearms in pre-conviction in domestic violence cases is only temporary and will only become permanent if convicted.

I am not a lawyer and the information above is not legal advice and should not be used to make any legal decisions in any legal proceedings.
 
To me its Interesting according to article the driver was from virgina beach and has the abc 11 news app and that was how he saw the incident. Maybe he lives here or travels to rdu alot now but just thought it might be a little odd you would have a out of town news app or just randomly be looking at it for a story about that if you didnt know something about the incident.
 
The reflective vest might have been a clue. You should have been paying better attention, that time of the morning.


:D


I would suspect the driver knew it wasn't a deer. He heard the deer thing on the news. He might have needed to dispose of something before turning himself in. But, that's all speculation.
 
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J R Green said:
I have yet to see a deer wearing reflectors and walking dogs on a leash. I have no doubt that he knew what he hit.
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I have not hit a (live) deer, thankfully. I have been on the road and come upon a deer carcass that I didnā€™t have time to avoid and ran over, but I knew what I hit. Tore some supports off my exhaust system too.
 
noway2 said:
I have not hit a (live) deer, thankfully. I have been on the road and come upon a deer carcass that I didnā€™t have time to avoid and ran over, but I knew what I hit. Tore some supports off my exhaust system too.
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I've hit two, at night, on a dark road. They're very distinctive, furry, long neck, on 4 legs and NO safety vest... I see plenty if deer around here and none of them have safety vest.
 
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georgel said:
I've hit two, at night, on a dark road. They're very distinctive, furry, long neck, on 4 legs and NO safety vest... I see plenty if deer around here and none of them have safety vest.
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We were pulling the travel trailer and traffic on 421 started slowing down and I braked hard enough to notice the trailer brakes. A deer ran across the road and jumped the fence in the median and the oncoming car hit it. It flew 20ā€™ into the air with its head flopping before bouncing on the ground and not the median. They definitely knew what they hit,

while it is conceivable to hit something and not know what, itā€™s unlikely this driver did,

One morning I was in a rush to catch a flight at PTI and pulled into a parking deck only to have the stall malfunction and not give tickets. I put it in reverse without looking and felt that characteristic BAM of a car crash. I got out and nobody was there,I guess they thought they rammed not m and took off. Hope that trailer hitch did a number on their bumper.
 
Easy to confuse. I just saw a deer walking two Yorkies the other day.
No vest, but the way the sun reflected off the horns/fur made it look just like a blaze orange vest (the thing hunters west to not look like animals).
Yeah buddy.
 
@Average Joe , thank you for taking the time to explain that. That's a good point that it requires less evidence to charge him than it does to convict him. It does seem like it would be difficult for the DA to prove beyond any reasonable doubt what he knew (though if the previous posts represent the jury's thoughts, maybe not).

It's interesting that his charge for Death By Vehicle is a misdemeanor, but the Hit and Run is a felony. I imagine he knew, panicked, and ran. Later, knowing the damage to the truck would be impossible to explain, he came up with the deer story.
 
So when our wonderful ex-Governor Mike Easley took a guilty plea for felony campaign law violations, would he have lost his hunting rifles? That seems pretty stupid, he had no criminal record, and it's not like he was a threat to public safety.

I know a man that was using his employer's FedEx account for his personal business. Because it exceeded $500 (over many months), and his employer was the victim, that made it felony embezzlement. I'm no advocate for thieves, but a lifetime ban on guns and inability to ever pass a pre-employment background check seems a pretty harsh. So many things are a felony now, I imagine I've unwittingly committed several this year.
 
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J R Green said:
I have yet to see a deer wearing reflectors and walking dogs on a leash. I have no doubt that he knew what he hit.
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Possible he was drinking or something and either (A) really had no idea, or (B) wanted a few hours to let whatever it was get out of his system. OR (B.1) had a woman with him that he didn't want people to know about who was also distracting him in some way and he wanted to get her gone...
 
MostWanted said:
...That seems pretty stupid, he had no criminal record, and it's not like he was a threat to public safety.
...
I'm no advocate for thieves, but a lifetime ban on guns and inability to ever pass a pre-employment background check seems a pretty harsh. So many things are a felony now, I imagine I've unwittingly committed several this year.
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Agreed.
There's a guy called Harvey Silvergate that wrote a book named "Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent". There is video of him talking about the topic available on the internet.
It's also worth noting that Trumps pick to replace RBG on SCotUS is on record saying that a lifetime ban on firearms ownership for crimes that have nothing to do with violence is throwing the "shall not be infringed" thing out the window for no good reason.
 
I am not a lawyer, and I have very little experience with criminal law, but my understanding is that the proof at trial can be as simple as the argument that a reasonable person would have known that they hit a person and not a deer or that given the damage to the vehicle a reasonable person would have stopped to investigate. Or maybe itā€™s a newer truck and the systems will tell police that the guy did stop before fleeing.

Just my belief, could be wrong.
 
he may have been distracted by his phone etc and DIDNā€™T even see what he hit.

not any better but definitely not unlikely
 
I've hit deer and other animals in my lifetime. In all instances, I got out of the vehicle. Sometimes I put them down, or dragged them out of the road, but I always stopped.

Then again, I wasn't drunk at 6:30 in the morning or staring at my damn phone while I ran somebody/thing over.
 
The man was driving his employer's box truck at 6:30am so I'm guessing he was sober. It was a work vehicle so he probably didn't need to rid himself of anything or any passenger.

I don't know why this case has captured my attention so much. Maybe because it's so close to home, maybe because I know it could be me either behind the wheel or as a victim on my bicycle. So I've been playing this "what if it was me" game in my head. I could call 911, say that I have a truck that may have been involved in the H&R this morning in Cary. When they arrive, make no other statement other than "I'm in the process of obtaining an attorney and I can provide more information after speaking with him.". That would be better than having them find the truck on their own. Attorney advises you to say, "I was adjusting the radio when I felt a bump. I didn't see what I hit but I thought it would be a deer. It's October, deer season, in the rut, and the time of day when they are the most active. As soon as I learned it was a person, I contacted 911 and assisted in the investigation." Attorney arranges for you to plead guilty to misdemeanor death by vehicle and distracted driving. Is that reasonable?
 
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MostWanted said:
Maybe because it's so close to home, maybe because I know it could be me either behind the wheel or as a victim on my bicycle.
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This reminds me of why whenever I see a motorcycle on the road I try to let them get as far away from me as possible. I most definitely do NOT want them riding in front of me. The reason being that itā€™s been psychologically demonstrated that people are expecting to see cars and that they are less likely to see a motorcycle.

Now the one I had the other day that was riding a foot off the back bumper of my car and proceeded to do so to others could have used a brake check. :eek: Heā€™ll learn one of these days.
 
Seems like plenty of bad decisions made by both parties. One will have huge legal and monetary consequences to pay, the other paid the ultimate price. Our lives will be much less complicated if we pay more attention to our surroundings as we ride this big ball through space at 67,000 MPH . Ship happens fast at that speed.
 
MostWanted said:
@Average Joe , thank you for taking the time to explain that. That's a good point that it requires less evidence to charge him than it does to convict him. It does seem like it would be difficult for the DA to prove beyond any reasonable doubt what he knew (though if the previous posts represent the jury's thoughts, maybe not).

It's interesting that his charge for Death By Vehicle is a misdemeanor, but the Hit and Run is a felony. I imagine he knew, panicked, and ran. Later, knowing the damage to the truck would be impossible to explain, he came up with the deer story.
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There are actually 2 levels to death by motor vehicle. One is a misdemeanor and the other is a felony. I would have to refresh my memory on the aggravating factors which ups it to a felony.


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MostWanted said:
The man was driving his employer's box truck at 6:30am so I'm guessing he was sober. It was a work vehicle so he probably didn't need to rid himself of anything or any passenger.

I don't know why this case has captured my attention so much. Maybe because it's so close to home, maybe because I know it could be me either behind the wheel or as a victim on my bicycle. So I've been playing this "what if it was me" game in my head. I could call 911, say that I have a truck that may have been involved in the H&R this morning in Cary. When they arrive, make no other statement other than "I'm in the process of obtaining an attorney and I can provide more information after speaking with him.". That would be better than having them find the truck on their own. Attorney advises you to say, "I was adjusting the radio when I felt a bump. I didn't see what I hit but I thought it would be a deer. It's October, deer season, in the rut, and the time of day when they are the most active. As soon as I learned it was a person, I contacted 911 and assisted in the investigation." Attorney arranges for you to plead guilty to misdemeanor death by vehicle and distracted driving. Is that reasonable?
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The work truck changes things a bit. Depending on level of license and size of truck, class B or C, there are more things you are trying to keep up with in the cab. If you are doing things right. We just added some systems to our truck that I find unnervingly distracting. And unless I know I've hit a person, I'm not stopping at the scene for anything. Because I likely cannot find a place to safely stop. I've hit things and barely gotten a glimpse of them. I can see for miles in traffic but if something darts across the road and I'm looking at a mirror, I might not see it. And as a driver, I wonder which way the walker was going on the road. I see way too many people with their back to traffic walking. It's a terrible situation for sure.
 
I haven't hit too many deer over the years but every time I have, I would stop and (a) see if the animal needed to be euthanized and (b) assess the damage to my vehicle. No point in continuing on until overheat if, say, an antler punctured the radiator. Esp. if it is the bosses truck.

Seems that a reasonable person would do the same. Perhaps that weighed on the level of charges?
 
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If I hit anything I pull over and check what happened. Who would just drive away not knowing? Seems fishy to me.
 
For several years while I was still deer hunting and my son-in-law was going to reserve meetings at Bragg in the early morning, he got more deer than I did. As Green said above, none of the deer were wearing reflective vests and there was no doubt whatsoever in S-I-L's mind what he hit. Let me do some surmising here. Is it possible that the driver's immigration status was just a tiny bit wavy? Was he distracted in the vehicle when the accident occurred (cell phone, something falling, etc.)? The sounds of hitting a grown woman and at least one dog are not like a deer. Plus, she was wearing a reflective vest. When he, the driver, got back from his route the damage was spotted and he was counseled to fess up himself or they would do it for him.
 
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I suspect there is a another reason he didn't stop.

That said there are a lot of pedestrians that walk ,ride bicycles that are just obvious to the fact that you are the one thats responsible for your safety in this world. Bicyclists will ride in tandem and block traffic from going around ,I just don't understand what they are thinking. I see people walking in the road when there is a sidewalk too. Sometimes the pedestrians share fault in some cases.

Darwin will come for them eventually.
 
Not at all to justify the driverā€™s actions...

People need to GTFO of the road when walking. There has been a noticeable up tick in people walking/jogging the rural roads around me. Some wear a vest and some donā€™t. None get out of the road when you approach in a vehicle.

Itā€™s not so much a ā€œpeople arenā€™t allowed in the roadā€ thing for meā€”itā€™s exactly what happened here for me. The risk of hitting and hurting someone.

Luckily Iā€™m always on the lookout for deer around here, so itā€™s not too hard to spot them. But every once in a while thereā€™s one out at pre-dawn or dusk hours thatā€™s difficult to see.

Iā€™d imagine this guyā€™s charges would be much less if heā€™d stopped and not ā€œrun.ā€ Possibly only the misdemeanor death charge since pedestrians arenā€™t allowed in the road.
 
Considering the guy could have just not turned himself in makes me think his story lines up. A reflective vest is only good when you're facing the light- if the dog walker was turned sideways while the dogs were taking a dump, no reflection. If after the hit while moving, you see an animal (dog) in the side mirror, not too hard to think it was a deer as you're driving along in the twilight.

I'm terribly sorry for the death, but I would like to think it was an unfortunate accident.
 
All this talk about the driver or the woman - which was at fault.... But what about the poor little doggie that got killed. Doesn't anyone care about the doggie????:rolleyes:
 
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