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 girls searching for mental well being treatment trapped in a cage in the again was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in jail.

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, however their families mentioned they were not violent. Newton was solely seeking medication for her fear and nervousness and Green’s family mentioned she was committed to a mental facility at a regular mental health appointment by a counselor she had never seen earlier than.

Flood, 69, was sentenced about 30 minutes after the decision and after several kinfolk of the women stated his determination to press ahead with the shortest route left an impossible-to-fix gap in their lives.

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

Circuit Courtroom Judge William Seales sentenced Flood to 5 years in prison on every involuntary manslaughter charge and 4 years on each reckless homicide 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, stopping the women from being able to get out the sliding door they used to enter the van. Flood and a deputy with him did not have a key to a second door and there was no emergency escape hatch, in line with testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies mentioned they spoke to the ladies and tried to maintain them calm for about an hour because the water saved rising earlier than it received too harmful and rescuers might no longer hear them.

“How awful should which have been to take a seat there and wait in your own demise?” Solicitor Ed Clements said in his closing argument Thursday.

Whereas other factors like an emergency radio that didn't notify rescuers of the van's precise location contributed to the deaths, Clements said the drownings all came out of Flood’s reckless determination to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) via water.

Nationwide guard troops put up barricades on U.S. Freeway 76 just outside Nichols, but Flood drove round them after briefly talking to the troopers.

Clements read from Flood's statement to investigators that he felt like as soon as he was within the water, he could not flip round as a result of he may now not see the sting of the freeway and was fearful about operating into a ditch hidden by the water.

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

Flood's lawyer said while it was a horrible tragedy, others have been making an attempt to unfairly blame simply the previous deputy as an alternative of the equipment issues, the troops that waived them across the barricades and supervisors who knew dangerous flooding was beginning and despatched him even though taking the ladies to the psychological well being facilities was not an emergency.

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

Flood didn't testify, but earlier than he was sentenced instructed the judge he tried all the things he might to keep the women calm because the waters rose and assist was slow to arrive.

“It was a sequence of mistakes on my part and other people that led me to that point and I’m sorry for what occurred to the girls,” Flood stated.

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 2 counts of involuntary manslaughter at a later date.

They tried to shoot the locks off the second door, nevertheless it still 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 started engaged on the cage, but the water got larger and sooner and it was too harmful to proceed.

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

“I can forgive, however I cannot overlook. Fortunately, I nonetheless bear in mind my mother as a contented girl, a joyful woman who cherished her household," he mentioned. “However you, Mr. Flood, will bear in mind my mom by listening to her screams at the back of that van."

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