Having heard that I'd been on jury duty, an out-of-town relative asked if we'd "put the bad guy away." I thought for a few moments and told her that I didn't think the defendant was a bad person, but that she had made some very bad choices.
I'd like to share what I told her so that Amy Senser's children can hear it, too.
I shared that Ms. Senser had accidentally and tragically killed a pedestrian and that she had left the scene and delayed reporting her involvement. She was convicted of two felony charges: failure to stop at the time of the accident and failure to notify authorities right away.
It is the details of the first charge that I wish to share. It stated that Senser had failed to stop at the scene of an accident knowing that her accident had involved either 1) injury or death to another person or 2) damage to another vehicle. She needed to be found guilty of either of those things -- but not necessarily both.
The jury convicted on the second part of this charge -- unanimously believing that Senser knew that she had hit something significant, something more significant than a pothole or a construction barrel, and that she had left the scene believing she had hit a car.
The majority of the jurors, however, did not have enough evidence to believe that she knew at the time of the accident that she'd hit a person.
As a jury, we did believe that at least by the next day Senser knew she had been involved in the accident that killed Anousone Phanthavong. Her failure to notify law enforcement right away of her involvement was the second guilty verdict. We also found her guilty of careless driving, but not of gross negligence.
Many of the jurors wanted Senser to know the distinction in our determination on Charge 1. We sent a note to the judge asking to share this during the reading of the verdicts. Unfortunately, our note could not be shared in court.
