Ex-deputy will get 18 years after detainees drown in locked van

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- A deputy in South Carolina whose police van was swept away by floodwaters in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence, drowning two girls seeking psychological well being treatment trapped in a cage within the again was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in prison.

A Marion County jury discovered former Horry County deputy Stephen Flood guilty of two counts of involuntary manslaughter and two counts of reckless murder.

Judges ordered Wendy Newton, 45, and Nicolette Green, 43, to be involuntarily committed the day they died in September 2018, however their families said they were not violent. Newton was only searching for medication for her concern and nervousness and Green’s household mentioned she was dedicated to a psychological facility at a regular mental well being appointment by a counselor she had by no means seen before.

Flood, 69, was sentenced about 30 minutes after the verdict and after a number of family of the ladies said his decision to press ahead with the shortest route left an impossible-to-fix gap in their lives.

“This was a deliberate act set in motion by a pompous, stubborn man,” Inexperienced's sister Donnela Inexperienced-Johnson advised the judge. “He abused the belief my sister, Nikki, Wendy and the state of South Carolina entrusted him with. And for what? To save time.”

Circuit Court Decide William Seales sentenced Flood to five years in jail on each involuntary manslaughter charge and 4 years on every reckless murder cost and ordered the sentences served back-to-back.

The floodwaters swept the police van off its wheels in September 2018 and pinned it in opposition to a guardrail, stopping the ladies from having the ability to get out the sliding door they used to enter the van. Flood and a deputy with him didn't have a key to a second door and there was no emergency escape hatch, in keeping with testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies said they spoke to the ladies and tried to keep them calm for about an hour because the water saved rising earlier than it got too harmful and rescuers may no longer hear them.

“How terrible should that have been to sit there and wait for your personal loss of life?” Solicitor Ed Clements mentioned in his closing argument Thursday.

Whereas other factors like an emergency radio that failed to notify rescuers of the van's exact location contributed to the deaths, Clements mentioned the drownings all came out of Flood’s reckless choice to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by means of water.

National guard troops put up barricades on U.S. Freeway 76 simply exterior Nichols, but Flood drove around them after briefly speaking to the soldiers.

Clements read from Flood's assertion to investigators that he felt like as soon as he was in the water, he could not turn around because he may now not see the sting of the freeway and was fearful about working into a ditch hidden by the water.

“Possibly it wounded his delight or stubbornness. I don’t know. He pushed forward into water that was not simply standing in a tall puddle, but it was dashing, crossing the guardrail. All of it was the Little Pee Dee River by then,” Clements mentioned.

Flood's lawyer stated whereas it was a horrible tragedy, others had been making an attempt to unfairly blame simply the former deputy instead of the gear problems, the troops that waived them across the barricades and supervisors who knew dangerous flooding was beginning and despatched him though taking the women to the mental well being services was not an emergency.

"I ask that you simply resist the urge to try to give justice to those two ladies by giving injustice to this good man," defense legal professional Jarrett Bouchette said. “They need to make him a scapegoat for this accident.”

Flood did not testify, but before he was sentenced informed the decide he tried every part he might to keep the women calm as the waters rose and help was sluggish to reach.

“It was a sequence of errors on my half and different folks that led me to that time and I’m sorry for what occurred to the ladies,” Flood said.

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, had been eventually rescued from the highest of the transport van, authorities said. Bishop will stand trial for two counts of involuntary manslaughter at a later date.

They tried to shoot the locks off the second door, however it nonetheless wouldn't open. The delay in getting assist was costly too. A firefighter testified they were able to reduce the roof off the van and began working on the cage, however the water got higher and quicker and it was too dangerous to continue.

Newton's son Charles stated he hated that Flood needed to learn to follow the principles and use widespread sense at such a steep value.

“I can forgive, however I cannot neglect. Thankfully, I still remember my mom as a cheerful woman, a joyful lady who liked her family," he said. “But you, Mr. Flood, will bear in mind my mom by listening to her screams behind that van."

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Comply with Jeffrey Collins on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JSCollinsAP.