Ex-deputy gets 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 ladies seeking psychological well being therapy trapped in a cage within the back 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 homicide.

Judges ordered Wendy Newton, 45, and Nicolette Inexperienced, 43, to be involuntarily committed the day they died in September 2018, but their households stated they were not violent. Newton was solely looking for medication for her concern and anxiety and Green’s household stated she was committed to a psychological facility at an everyday psychological well being appointment by a counselor she had by no means seen earlier than.

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

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

Circuit Court docket Decide William Seales sentenced Flood to 5 years in jail on every involuntary manslaughter cost and four years on each 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 against a guardrail, preventing the women from being able 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, according to testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies stated they spoke to the ladies and tried to maintain them calm for about an hour as the water saved rising before it received too dangerous and rescuers might not hear them.

“How terrible should that have been to sit there and wait to your personal dying?” Solicitor Ed Clements said 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 said the drownings all came out of Flood’s reckless determination to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by means of water.

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

Clements read from Flood's assertion to investigators that he felt like once he was within the water, he could not turn around because he could no longer see the sting of the highway and was fearful about operating into a ditch hidden by the water.

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

Flood's lawyer mentioned whereas it was a terrible tragedy, others have been making an attempt to unfairly blame simply the former deputy as an alternative of the gear issues, the troops that waived them across the barricades and supervisors who knew harmful flooding was starting and despatched him even though taking the ladies to the mental health facilities was not an emergency.

"I ask that you simply resist the urge to try to give justice to these two ladies by giving injustice to this good man," defense lawyer Jarrett Bouchette stated. “They want to make him a scapegoat for this accident.”

Flood didn't testify, but earlier than he was sentenced informed the judge he tried everything he might to maintain the women calm as the waters rose and help was sluggish to arrive.

“It was a series of mistakes on my half and other those who led me to that time and I’m sorry for what happened to the girls,” Flood mentioned.

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, have been ultimately rescued from the top of the transport van, authorities stated. Bishop will stand trial for 2 counts of involuntary manslaughter at a later date.

They tried to shoot the locks off the second door, nevertheless it nonetheless would not open. The delay in getting assist was expensive too. A firefighter testified they have been in a position to cut the roof off the van and began working on the cage, but the water received larger and quicker and it was too dangerous to continue.

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

“I can forgive, but I can't overlook. Happily, I nonetheless remember my mom as a cheerful woman, a joyful lady who liked her household," he stated. “But you, Mr. Flood, will keep in mind my mom by hearing her screams behind that van."

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