D363 wrote:Bonefishblues wrote:D363 wrote:
Possibly. But she's already playing the victim card and unfortunately even when prosecutions do proceed, that tends to play well at trial.
Sadly I suspect the Dunn's experience is an all too common one in some respects. While the publicity has been wide it could well be that the high politics dimension will obscure this side of it - namely that loss of life on roads is so often dismissed as an unfortunate accident from which nothing can be learned or changed.
How so?
In raising the prospect of a 14 year sentence. Although her lawyer is (presumably) only trained in US law, it's basic legal knowledge that the 14 year upper limit applies where there are aggravating factors and that such a sentence isn't even remotely possible in this case.
She's raised it as a possibility though, as a justification for staying in the US and presenting the prosecution as an excessive reaction to an unfortunate accident.
Lawyer doing lawyer's job, to present his client in the 'best' way. "...a potential penalty up to 14 years..."
Clearly, everyone would have preferred she stayed, faced the music, received 18 months, suspended, saw the victim's parents making the customary 'travesty of justice' speech outside the court, whereupon she'd have flown to the US, never to be seen again.
At least this way, we can rail against the injustice of it all for a little while longer, a jot of difference it won't make in either this case, or others of its ilk..