{"id":159711146,"date":"2010-01-23T12:12:26","date_gmt":"2010-01-23T12:12:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=159711146"},"modified":"2010-01-23T12:12:26","modified_gmt":"2010-01-23T12:12:26","slug":"man-driving-in-fatal-hit-and-run-was-texting-gets-five-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=159711146","title":{"rendered":"Man driving in fatal hit and run was texting; gets five years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Posted by Jonathan Maus (Editor-in-Chief)<\/a> on January 22nd, 2010 at 1:26 pm <\/p>\n

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3<\/span> tweets<\/span> <\/span> <\/a> retweet<\/a> <\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\"image\"<\/p>\n
Screenshot from KGW.com<\/a>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The Columbian was at the sentencing hearing<\/a> for Antonio Cellestine at the Clark County Courthouse in Vancouver today. According to their report<\/a>, Cellestine was sentenced to 5 years in prison for driving his car into 50-year old Gordon Patterson back in September<\/a>. A commenter who was at the hearing today, said<\/a> Cellestine\u2019s attorney plea bargained with the judge to not have the offense become his client\u2019s first strike.
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\nThe Columbian also reports that court documents reveal Cellestine was texting at the time of the collision. According to KGW<\/a>, Cellestine, who was 18 when the crash occurred, was driving with a suspended license at the time of the crash and his record includes two instances of driving with a suspended license, as well as driving without insurance.<\/p>\n

In court today, Cellestine was quoted in The Columbian as saying:<\/p>\n

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\u201cI feel no one knows how I really feel deep down inside and how I feel about things\u2026 This was not intentional; this was an accident\u2026He (Patterson) will always have a special place in my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This tragic chain of events comes as the U.S. Department of Transportation has ratcheted up their focus on distracted driving and one week after The Oprah Winfrey Show featured victims of distracted driving<\/a> on her show. It will take a lot more than snazzy slogans and some PR to deal with the issues this case so readily illustrates.<\/p>\n

On that note, here\u2019s a comment left below by a former transportation planner for the City of Vancouver that I felt was worth more attention:<\/p>\n

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\u201cSadly \u2026 this is a case influenced by what must be the very low regard that our law enforcement authorities and political leadership place on motor vehicle operators being certified and insured. There is a too common problem \u2013 motor vehicle operation on public streets is not a right but a responsibility\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026 A plea to our state legislators this session\u2026please make it less easy to buy insurance in order to get license tags and then cancel the account\u2026<\/p>\n

Another related legislative issue would be to strengthen the state law about cell phone\/texting use [aka distracted driving].<\/p>\n

As a bicyclist who has not owned a car for 22 years \u2013 this case and many too similar makes me wonder if I need to start driving again for more protection.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n


\nhttps:\/\/bikeportland.org\/2010\/01\/22\/man-driving-in-vancouver-hit-and-run-was-texting-gets-five-years\/<\/a>oldId.20100123121226579<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Posted by Jonathan Maus (Editor-in-Chief) on January 22nd, 2010 at 1:26 pm 3 tweets retweet Screenshot from KGW.com. The Columbian was at the sentencing hearing for Antonio Cellestine at the Clark County Courthouse in Vancouver today. According to their report, Cellestine was sentenced to 5 years in prison for driving his car into 50-year old … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Man driving in fatal hit and run was texting; gets five years”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-159711146","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biking-elsewhere"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159711146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=159711146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159711146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=159711146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=159711146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=159711146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}