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 therapy trapped in a cage in the again was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in jail.

A Marion County jury found former Horry County deputy Stephen Flood responsible of two counts of involuntary manslaughter and two counts of reckless homicide.

Judges ordered Wendy Newton, 45, and Nicolette Green, 43, to be involuntarily dedicated the day they died in September 2018, but their households stated they weren't violent. Newton was solely seeking medication for her worry and anxiety and Inexperienced’s household mentioned she was dedicated to a psychological facility at an everyday psychological well being appointment by a counselor she had by no means seen earlier than.

Flood, 69, was sentenced about half-hour after the decision and after several kinfolk of the ladies stated his decision to press forward with the shortest route left an impossible-to-fix hole in their lives.

“This was a deliberate act set in movement by a pompous, stubborn man,” Green's sister Donnela Green-Johnson advised the judge. “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 five years in jail on each involuntary manslaughter cost and four years on every reckless murder 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 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 accordance with 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 harmful and rescuers may now not hear them.

“How terrible should which were to sit there and wait in your own dying?” Solicitor Ed Clements said in his closing argument Thursday.

While other elements like an emergency radio that didn't notify rescuers of the van's precise location contributed to the deaths, Clements mentioned the drownings all got here out of Flood’s reckless choice to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by water.

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

Clements learn from Flood's assertion to investigators that he felt like as soon as he was within the water, he couldn't flip round as a result of he could now not see the edge of the freeway and was frightened about operating right into a ditch hidden by the water.

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

Flood's lawyer mentioned whereas it was a terrible tragedy, others had been making an attempt to unfairly blame simply the previous deputy instead of the tools issues, the troops that waived them around the barricades and supervisors who knew harmful flooding was beginning and despatched him although taking the women to the mental health amenities was not an emergency.

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

Flood didn't testify, however earlier than he was sentenced told the judge he tried all the things he may to maintain the women calm as the waters rose and help was gradual to arrive.

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

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, were finally rescued from the top of the transport van, authorities stated. 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 expensive too. A firefighter testified they had been in a position to minimize the roof off the van and began working on the cage, however the water got increased and sooner and it was too dangerous to proceed.

Newton's son Charles mentioned he hated that Flood needed to learn to comply with the foundations and use widespread sense at such a steep value.

“I can forgive, however I can not neglect. Fortuitously, I still remember my mom as a contented lady, a joyful girl who loved her family," he stated. “However you, Mr. Flood, will bear in mind my mom by listening to her screams in the back of that van."

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