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 within the aftermath of Hurricane Florence, drowning two women looking for psychological well being therapy trapped in a cage in 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 homicide.

Judges ordered Wendy Newton, 45, and Nicolette Green, 43, to be involuntarily committed the day they died in September 2018, however their households stated they weren't violent. Newton was only looking for drugs for her fear and anxiety and Inexperienced’s household mentioned she was dedicated to a psychological facility at a daily mental health appointment by a counselor she had never seen earlier than.

Flood, 69, was sentenced about 30 minutes after the verdict and after several relations of the ladies stated his choice to press ahead with the shortest route left an impossible-to-fix hole in their lives.

“This was a deliberate act set in movement by a pompous, cussed man,” Inexperienced's sister Donnela Green-Johnson instructed the choose. “He abused the trust my sister, Nikki, Wendy and the state of South Carolina entrusted him with. And for what? To avoid wasting time.”

Circuit Court Decide William Seales sentenced Flood to 5 years in prison on each involuntary manslaughter cost and 4 years on each reckless murder charge 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 with 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, according to testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies said they spoke to the women and tried to keep them calm for about an hour because the water saved rising before it obtained too dangerous and rescuers may not hear them.

“How awful must that have been to sit there and wait in your own dying?” Solicitor Ed Clements stated in his closing argument Thursday.

While different components like an emergency radio that didn't notify rescuers of the van's actual location contributed to the deaths, Clements said the drownings all got here out of Flood’s reckless determination to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by water.

Nationwide guard troops put up barricades on U.S. Freeway 76 simply outdoors Nichols, however Flood drove around them after briefly talking to the soldiers.

Clements read from Flood's statement to investigators that he felt like as soon as he was within the water, he couldn't flip around because he might no longer see the sting of the highway and was apprehensive about running right into a ditch hidden by the water.

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

Flood's lawyer said whereas it was a horrible tragedy, others were making an attempt to unfairly blame just the previous deputy as an alternative of the equipment problems, the troops that waived them around the barricades and supervisors who knew harmful flooding was beginning and sent him regardless that taking the women to the psychological health facilities was not an emergency.

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

Flood didn't testify, but earlier than he was sentenced advised the judge he tried every thing he may to keep the ladies calm because the waters rose and assist was gradual to reach.

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

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, were ultimately rescued from the highest 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 pricey too. A firefighter testified they were able to reduce the roof off the van and began working on the cage, but the water bought increased and sooner and it was too dangerous to proceed.

Newton's son Charles said he hated that Flood needed to be taught to observe the foundations and use common sense at such a steep worth.

“I can forgive, however I cannot overlook. Fortuitously, I still remember my mom as a cheerful woman, a joyful lady who liked her family," he mentioned. “However you, Mr. Flood, will keep in mind my mom by hearing her screams at the back of that van."

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