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 within the aftermath of Hurricane Florence, drowning two ladies looking for psychological health remedy trapped in a cage in the again was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in prison.

A Marion County jury found 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 dedicated the day they died in September 2018, but their families stated they were not violent. Newton was only looking for medication for her concern and anxiety and Inexperienced’s household stated she was dedicated to a psychological facility at a daily psychological health appointment by a counselor she had by no means seen before.

Flood, 69, was sentenced about half-hour after the verdict and after a number of family of the ladies said his determination 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 Inexperienced-Johnson informed the decide. “He abused the trust my sister, Nikki, Wendy and the state of South Carolina entrusted him with. And for what? To save time.”

Circuit Courtroom Decide William Seales sentenced Flood to 5 years in jail on each involuntary manslaughter cost and 4 years on each reckless homicide 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, preventing 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, in response to testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies said they spoke to the ladies and tried to maintain them calm for about an hour as the water stored rising before it obtained too dangerous and rescuers may no longer hear them.

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

Whereas different elements like an emergency radio that didn't notify rescuers of the van's exact location contributed to the deaths, Clements mentioned the drownings all came out of Flood’s reckless determination to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by water.

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

Clements read from Flood's assertion to investigators that he felt like as soon as he was within the water, he could not turn round because he might now not see the sting of the freeway and was worried about running right 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 simply 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 stated.

Flood's lawyer said whereas it was a terrible tragedy, others have been making an attempt to unfairly blame just the former deputy as an alternative of the tools problems, 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 mental well being amenities was not an emergency.

"I ask that you just 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 need to make him a scapegoat for this accident.”

Flood did not testify, however earlier than he was sentenced advised the choose he tried all the things he could to maintain the ladies calm as the waters rose and help was slow to reach.

“It was a sequence of errors on my half and other folks that led me to that time and I’m sorry for what happened to the women,” Flood stated.

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, have been ultimately 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, but it still wouldn't open. The delay in getting assist was pricey too. A firefighter testified they had been capable of lower the roof off the van and started working on the cage, but the water got increased and quicker and it was too dangerous to proceed.

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

“I can forgive, but I cannot neglect. Thankfully, I still keep in mind my mom as a happy woman, a joyful lady who loved her household," he stated. “But you, Mr. Flood, will bear in mind my mother 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.