Bikes are by far the transportation of choice among college students across the nation, so peddlers take note: for the first time ever, a cyclist has been found guilty of felony vehicular manslaughter.
That’s right – felony manslaughter.
And while this incident did not occur on campus, it’s an important precedent to trumpet, considering biking is second only to walking across the quad.
Zenon Evans, a College Fix summer intern at Reason, has the story:
In what is likely a first in the U.S., a California man has pled guilty to committing felony vehicular manslaughter while riding a bicycle. The New York Times explains …
Though no agency tracks national data on the severity of charges in such cases, many cycling advocates and law enforcement officials said this was the first felony charge they had heard of in such a case.
The incident took place on March 29, 2012. Chris Bucchere, a 37-year-old San Francisco resident, plowed through an intersection and into Sutchi Hui, a 71-year-old also of San Francisco. The pedestrian was dead four days later due to the seriousness of his injuries. Bucchere turned himself in and was charged.
The Chicago Tribune notes that “the same month Bucchere hit Hui, a bicyclist pleaded guilty in San Francisco to misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter for running down a 67-year-old woman who died a month later.”
Bucchere was hit with a felony rather than a misdemeanor after witnesses testified that he ran several red lights and a stop sign before colliding with Hui. Because the cyclist was using a GPS device to track his route, authorities were able to determine that Bucchere was traveling 30 mph.
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