Motorist Doctor Convicted on all counts

In a highly unusual incident, Physician Christopher Thomas Thompson was convicted on all charges in a Los Angeles court, including multiple felonies of intentionally causing a crash that seriously injured two bicyclist.

The story received, understandably, an enourmous amount of press, both in the industry and in the mass-media. Velonews ran extensive articles, as did the LA Times. It’s of course also been widely covered in the blogosphere but it is so unusual; I just had to write about it.

“Thompson was convicted of six felonies: two counts each of assault with a deadly weapon and battery with serious bodily injury as well as reckless driving causing specified injury and mayhem. He was also convicted of misdemeanor reckless driving.”

Somehow, this only tallies to a theoretical maximum of 10 years, which as the story points out, he is unlikely to receive.

Sentencing is Dec 3. (later delayed until Jan 18 according to velonews). I’d hate to see the taxpayers be saddled with the cost of a lengthy prison sentence; I would prefer to see him on house arrest with no possibility of ever driving again.

He apparently has completely ruined his own life: his lawyer in requesting that he be let out until sentencing, but the prosecutor objected saying  “he no longer lives or works in Los Angeles and was likely to lose his medical license soon”.

Sentancing

He got 5 years in prison. Something about facing a max of 8 years. see velonews here and here. I was glad to hear about the lifetime driver’s license revocation; this guy is obviously a dangerous kook when he gets behind the wheel. This revocation leaves me wondering what the deal is with judge’s discretion in sentancing.

“After sentencing Thompson to five years in California state prison, Millington issued a lifetime revocation of the defendant’s drivers license and ordered him to pay restitution to the victims as well.”

more funny things that defense lawyers say: “Thompson claimed that he had merely come to a stop in order to take a photograph of the riders as part of his effort to document what he believed to be a violation of local traffic rules. Thompson’s lawyer had argued that the cyclists were belligerent and may have fallen because of the inherent instability of bicycles”

Prior Bad Acts

Pelkey “the Explainer” had a very enlightening column about the rules of evidence involving admissability of  so-called “prior bad acts”, federal rule 404(B), and so forth.

The Aftermath

In a bit of encouraging news, the LA Times reports In a first, LAPD Chief Charlie Beck vows to better protect cyclists, train officers on biker rights.