Ex-deputy will get 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 women looking for psychological well being therapy trapped in a cage in the again was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in prison.

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

Judges ordered Wendy Newton, 45, and Nicolette Green, 43, to be involuntarily committed the day they died in September 2018, however their households mentioned they were not violent. Newton was only searching for medicine for her fear and nervousness and Green’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 several relatives of the ladies mentioned his decision to press forward with the shortest route left an impossible-to-fix hole of their lives.

“This was a deliberate act set in motion by a pompous, cussed man,” Green's sister Donnela Green-Johnson told 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 Court Judge William Seales sentenced Flood to 5 years in jail on every involuntary manslaughter cost 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 in opposition to a guardrail, preventing the women from having 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, based on testimony from the trial streamed by WMBF-TV.

The deputies said they spoke to the ladies and tried to keep them calm for about an hour as the water stored rising before it got too dangerous and rescuers might now not hear them.

“How terrible must that have been to sit down there and wait for your personal dying?” Solicitor Ed Clements said in his closing argument Thursday.

Whereas other components like an emergency radio that did not notify rescuers of the van's exact location contributed to the deaths, Clements stated the drownings all came out of Flood’s reckless decision to drive 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) by water.

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

Clements read from Flood's statement to investigators that he felt like once he was in the water, he couldn't turn round because he might not see the edge of the freeway and was frightened about operating into a ditch hidden by the water.

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

Flood's lawyer stated while it was a horrible tragedy, others have been attempting to unfairly blame just the previous deputy as a substitute of the equipment problems, the troops that waived them across the barricades and supervisors who knew dangerous flooding was starting and sent him although taking the women to the psychological well being facilities was not an emergency.

"I ask that you just resist the urge to try to give justice to those two women by giving injustice to this good man," defense attorney Jarrett Bouchette mentioned. “They need to make him a scapegoat for this accident.”

Flood didn't testify, however earlier than he was sentenced told the choose he tried every thing he could to maintain the women calm because the waters rose and help was gradual to reach.

“It was a sequence of mistakes on my part and different folks that led me to that point and I’m sorry for what happened to the ladies,” Flood stated.

Flood and the deputy with him, Joshua Bishop, have been ultimately rescued from the top of the transport van, authorities mentioned. Bishop will stand trial for 2 counts of involuntary manslaughter at a later date.

They tried to shoot the locks off the second door, but it nonetheless wouldn't open. The delay in getting assist was pricey too. A firefighter testified they have been able to lower the roof off the van and began engaged on the cage, but the water bought increased and faster and it was too dangerous to proceed.

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

“I can forgive, however I can't forget. Fortunately, I nonetheless keep in mind my mother as a cheerful woman, a joyful lady who beloved her family," he mentioned. “But you, Mr. Flood, will keep in mind my mother by hearing her screams in the back of that van."

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