Drive drunk, hit a pedestrian, sever his leg, and serve 120 days. Some justice system, eh?

[proud2BlibKansan]

A judge today stuck to his plan to order the driver in a fatal hit-and-run freed after 120 days in prison, despite objections from prosecutors and the victim’s parents.

Jackson County Circuit Judge John Torrence heard testimony from Kelly Riemann, whose son Daniel Riemann was struck and killed on Mother’s Day 2008 as he crossed Ward Parkway near 55th Street.

Later, bailiffs removed Kelly Riemann and Kevin Riemann, Daniel’s father, from the courtroom after being reprimanded by the judge.

Curtis Mertensmeyer, 21, had admitted being the driver when his car hit Daniel Riemann. The victim’s body was found 139 feet from the impact; his severed leg another 200 feet beyond that.

Mertensmeyer also admitted drinking that night, speeding and fleeing the scene.

more . . . http://www.kansascity.com/news/breaking_news/story/1260930.html

[Obamanaut]

1. And the pedestrian is dead, too.

"...was struck and killed on Mother’s Day 2008 as he crossed Ward Parkway near 55th Street..."

[Lerkfish]

2. lemme guess: the driver is white and affluent.

just a guess.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. Very much so

Sickening, isn't it?

[Retired AF Dem]

6. Even affluent black drivers

get over to.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/miami-dade/breaking-news/story/1099564.html

[AlphaCentauri]

8. I judicial system that doesn't peach for equality n/t

[emilyg]

23. Didn't the black football

player who killed a man get off easy?

[MadMaddie]

31. Yes see post 30

[CC]

3. Some judges and people do not

see death by a drunk driver as the violent homicide it is. Until people can look at it as a deliberate disregard of a human life and realize that being crushed to death by 2 tons of metal is a violent death you will keep seeing these types of sentences. This day and age there is no excuse for getting behind the wheel after drinking.

[taterguy]

10. Is there ever a valid excuse to get behind the wheel?

Well, yes there is.

If you start a thread saying people shouldn't drive at all you'll be besieged with replies about how people have to drive because they have no other choice.

Maybe if we changed that we'd have less carnage from drunken drivers.

[CC]

19. After drinking? No, there is no valid

excuse for it after drinking. I don't mean a glass of wine or one beer and maybe should of qualified it as after drinking and carrying a buzz. No valid excuse IMHO. Make arrangements before you start drinking or do not drink. If you don't bother and you get behind the wheel then you are a selfish asshole that doesn't care who you will kill or maim.

Then again maybe you would feel like I do if someone you loved took over an hour and a half to die as he hung upside down crushed in a car all the while awake and telling EMS he didn't want to die yet. All be cause some asshole felt he could drive after a few beers beers.



Edited to add = Not directed to you there and I am touchy on it and do not mean to sound harsh at you. But aimed at anyone that thinks there is a valid excuse to be driving after drinking.

[Fovea]

4. When Mike Brady was mowed down on his bike

in the middle of a race by a guy with 14 previous moving violations-- who got off.
The prosecutor said that that to get away with murder in Missouri you just had to use the right weapon.
An automobile.

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. I hadn't heard about that

How awful!

[Fovea]

11. HIs widow came to a MoBikeFed meeting

and told the whole story.
It ripped my heart out.

[sarcasmo]

9. Donte' Stallworth is only going to do 30 days for killing a person driving drunk. Rich, no time.

Poor, plenty of time.

[pitohui]

12. is it justice to punish someone for having a disease?

there is more than one side to this, we are told that alcoholism is a disease -- a disease that is incurable for most -- this is what addiction means -- an addict can't fucking QUIT, get it?


we have a poor infrastructure that pretty much forces a person to drive a car to get where they are going unless you live in one of the few places with safe/adequate public transport like manhattan or san francisco

while the drunk is not sympathetic, the reality is, he's a victim too

to equate drunk driving, even homicide drunk driving, with murder is just plain over the top

addiction is a disease of the brain, it is not under the person's control and pretending that it is so that we can vent our rage on the diseased individual does not strike me as particularly helpful

if all the money that had gone into punishment and jails and rehabs that don't work, for the last 40 years, had instead gone into light rail/better and more regular buses, etc. we could have saved life and limb of a great many people

trying to punish people w. a disease of the brain is just NOT gonna work, trying to punish them more and longer is not gonna work, it is just gonna destroy more families

many functional alcoholics are otherwise productive members of society, hold jobs, pay taxes, take care of their families, putting them in jail for a long period of time accomplishes nothing except to pad the pockets of the private prison system and the rehab hospitals that we all KNOW from experience and observation don't work worth a damn

do you honestly believe anyone CHOOSES to be an alcoholic? c'mon, get real

you probably have at least one close friend or family member who drives drunk, do you really want their life destroyed? do you think that friend/ family member asked to have a disease? do you think if/when they have an accident that they are an evil person or is it just possible that they are a SICK person who had an accident?

i'm getting tired of the witch burning in this society

in a "just" world, you don't punish people for having an incurable disease, and when 10 percent of society is prone to some kind of drug/alcohol addiction, you don't have a public transportation system that forces people to drive because there is no other real choice

keep in mind that when you're calling out for harsh punishments, since you are not likely all that rich either, the harsh punishment will be far more likely to be administered to you or to someone close to you -- it still won't affect the NFL player types, in fact, if the punishment is too harsh, the rich person will spend any amount of $$$ to pay off and make it go away, so they won't get punished at all, and it will all fall on the middle class

we screamed for zero tolerance and now we are shocked when our children are kicked out of school for having a baby aspirin, oh, i guess zero tolerance was only supposed to affect those "others" not us

what you wish for others...could come back on someone close to you

[proud2BlibKansan]

17. He killed someone

As in no longer alive.

He hit him so hard his leg was severed. Then he left the scene of the accident. His victim's flesh was stuck to the windshield of his car. And he kept driving.

Personally, I don't give a rat's ass if he is an alcoholic. I am a long time AlAnon member. You don't need to lecture me about the disease of alcoholism. I have lived it. One of the first people I met when I joined AlAnon was a woman whose husband had killed a family of 6 when he drove drunk. My heart still aches for her. But she readily admitted her husband belonged in prison. At least he wasn't drinking there.

How ludicrous for you to compare driving drunk and killing someone with a kid getting in trouble at school for having a baby aspirin. That's quite a stretch. LOL

[ljm2002]

20. I've had plenty of experience with alcoholics and addicts...

...and somehow none of them got behind the wheel and sped when overly intoxicated, nor did they kill someone.

So while I may agree that it is a sickness, I cannot agree with a 120-day sentence for manslaughter in a case like this. Negligence, disregard for someone else's safety, driving while intoxicated -- fast enough to throw someone 140 feet -- sorry, "he's a victim too" just does not wash IMO.

[CC]

21. Then treat it like any other disease

that affects driving. Diabetics that need insulin are not allowed to drive commercial trucks and those that can not control their disease even with insulin are not allowed to drive. People with epilepsy that cannot be controlled are not allowed drivers licenses. Most people with a known medical condition that affects their ability to drive have to jumps through hoops to get a drivers license. Make alcoholics do the same.

[paulsby]

13. you are making an unsupported, if not false, claim

you claim "drive drunk"

i read the article. twice.

i see no evidence that he was convicted of "driving drunk" DUI etc.

it says he admitted drinking that night, it does NOT say he was found to have been DUI

there is a difference.

people need to read for CONTENT and not make assumptions.

i tried to find a PC cert or charge sheet or something to see if he was charged with DUI, fwiw, and could not find one.

but unless you know something that is not in the article, there is no justification for the claim that he drove drunk.

(also note technically speaking, DUI does not require one be "drunk", merely impaired to a certain level, but that's another discussion)

[Telly Savalas]

14. This has been a fairly well known story in Kansas City.

So the original poster isn't making assumptions, but has almost certainly read the CONTENT of numerous other accounts of this story since the original accident. For example:

Mertensmeyer admitted he had been drinking and speeding. According to court documents, Riemann's blood alcohol content was more than three times the legal limit.

http://www.kmbc.com/news/19802803/detail.html

[paulsby]

15. i stand corrected. my bad

if his blood content was THREEE TIMES the legal limit, he wasn't only DUI. he was fricken hammered.

it's just that there was no mention of his claim in the article linked to.

thanks for the clarification

[some guy]

27. actually

the person with the BAC 3 times the legal limit was the person who got hit by the car, and was thus a pedestrian; neither driving nor DUI.

[proud2BlibKansan]

16. Thank you

This is such a disgusting story. I am shocked that he really did do only 120 days in jail.

[Telly Savalas]

25. Yeah, you gotta wonder what kind of his connections his family has.

[proud2BlibKansan]

33. Mission Hills family

I grew up in Prairie Village and went to school with Mission Hills kids. There were some wonderful families but also some who thought they were above the law and their shit didn't stink.

But Thomas Frank is from Mission Hills so it can't be all bad. LOL

[some guy]

28. you have a really good link

in your post - specifically because it contains further links to earlier reposts on the particular case.

Mertensmeyer is the driver, who admitted having been drinking. He was not tested for BAC because he turned himself in "several (or a few - I forget exactly) days after the accident occurred. No one knows precisely how much he had consumed, nor his BAC at the time of the accident. A different story linked fro your link says he was suing the fraternity he had pledged to, essentially it was the frat's fault he was driving at the time of the collison.

Riemann was the pedestrian in the case. Apparently his BAC, which was testable because he was dead - was 3 times the legal limit. Presumably his judgment was impaired in terms of being able to decide whether it was safe to cross the street when he did.
(I'm not saying that makes it okay he got run over, just clarifying who is/was who in the case.)

[proud2BlibKansan]

32. The driver is suing his fraternity

for making him an alcoholic.

[Thothmes]

24. That is not how it is done on this forum

a brief scan of the title line is sufficient to form conclusion and express outrage based on these conclusions. Facts are immaterial in many of these cases.

[izquierdista]

18. Good thing he was drunk and not downloading

If he had been ripping some mp3s while he was driving, THEN he would have the book thrown at him.

[LisaL]

22. Why did the judge release him?

The guy admits that he was drinking that night, speeding, and he left the scene? And yet judge lets him go after 4 months?
:mad:

[proud2BlibKansan]

34. Wealthy family, good lawyer

[Taitertots]

26. The Alcohol lobby

I'm sure the billions spent on Alcohol advertisement is not effecting media coverage of alcohol.


Burn the Love Guru and spend 6 months. Murder someone with a car get 3 months. I wonder if corporate interests are effecting the justice system.

[proud2BlibKansan]

36. And the alcohol lobby in MO is BUSCH

Anheiser that is. As in Budweiser.

MO was one of the last states to ban open containers because of the alcohol lobby.

[Franzia]

29. It's a legal system. There is no justice.

[MadMaddie]

30. Drunk driving is still not being handled as it should be.

You can't advertise cigerattes on TV, in movie theatres, certain publications because it would influence young people.

But liquor and beer is advertised on TV, in movie theaters and every major publication you can find.

Here is a case of a Pro Football player that killed someone on the beach
http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?prov=ap&slug=ap-stallworth-pedestriankilled&type=lgns

His sentence:
30 day jail sentence
After his release from jail, he must serve two years of house arrest and spend eight years on probation. The house arrest provisions will allow him to resume his football career, his attorney said.


We read about these deaths created by drunk drives every day and the people that were driving didn't mean to kill anyone. Many times these drivers are mulitiple offenders.....

Something is going to have to change.

[Laurier]

35. Well, let's talk about it. What would an appropriate sentence be, in your view?

Seriously.

What would you propose?

[proud2BlibKansan]

37. 10 years

Plus rehab and loss of driving privileges.

[omega minimo]

38. And their "reprimand" was for 119 days?

:puke:

[proud2BlibKansan]

39. An updated article:

http://www.kansascity.com/637/story/1263060.html?storylink=omni_popular

The judge ordered the victim's family removed from the courtroom. And the judge says the victim's blood alcohol level was a contributing factor. (Oh, so if you are drunk and get hit by a car, too bad?!)

Driver's mom is an attorney who tried to help him avoid arrest. She was not charged with a crime.