The lives of three young Juneau residents changed forever on a sunny spring day two years ago after their car collided with a semi-truck. One was killed in the wreck. Another was permanently disabled. And now the driver is going to jail.<\/p>\n
William M. Buchkoski, 20, will serve one year in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of third-degree assault, both stemming from the March 26, 2014, car accident. On Tuesday morning, Juneau Superior Court Judge Philip Pallenberg sentenced Buchkoski to two years in prison for each count of assault \u2014 a class C felonies which can carry up to three years in prison. He decided to suspend three years of the four-year sentence.<\/p>\n
Pallenberg didn\u2019t arrive at his decision easily. After hearing from the defendant and the victims\u2019 family members, he had to take a 30-minute break to deliberate.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think sending William Buchkoski to jail for a year is going to make him a better person,\u201d Pallenberg told the court filled with mostly with members of the defendants\u2019 family. \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to bring about his rehabilitation. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s necessary to deter him from committing similar offenses. But I think that the court has to take into account things beyond what\u2019s best for William Buchkoski in imposing a sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n
A difficult <\/strong>balance<\/strong><\/p>\n According to Pallenberg and Angie Kemp, the assistant district attorney prosecuting the case, the court has to maintain a delicate balance with each sentence. It has to reaffirm societal norms and deter people from committing similar crimes. But Kemp told the Empire Tuesday that the court has to accomplish both of these goals without punishing the offender to the point that rehabilitation is no longer possible.<\/p>\n \u201cSome people think that we\u2019re just out to get people \u2014 to incarcerate \u2014 but that\u2019s not my view,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n During the sentencing, Kemp explained that striking this balance made this one of the more difficult cases she has prosecuted.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was a tragic situation, and everyone, I think, wishes that the circumstances had been different that day and that different choices had been made,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n The decisions that led to Tuesday\u2019s sentencing all started at McDonalds about an hour and a half before the car accident that claimed the life of Jessica Billy, 18, and left Shadd Rudick, Buchkoski\u2019s stepbrother, in a wheelchair without the ability to communicate verbally.<\/p>\n [Driver in 2014 fatal car crash pleads guilty<\/a>]<\/p>\n It was there that Buchkoski smoked marijuana before driving \u2014 a decision that Kemp argued impaired his abilities and caused him to misjudge the distance between his 1999 CRV and an oncoming semi-truck as he turned left from Yandukin drive onto Old Dairy Road.<\/p>\n \u201cMarijuana, by its very nature, is a drug that makes it difficult to perceive distances, spatial distances,\u201d Kemp said, paraphrasing the report of one expert witness.<\/p>\n The skid marks left by the semi\u2019s tires began about 100 feet away from where Buchkoski attempted to make his turn, Kemp said. That\u2019s roughly the distance between home plate and first base, which is simply not enough time for a truck of that size going at between 40 and 50 miles per hour to stop, Kemp argued.<\/p>\n Tear-jerking testimony<\/strong><\/p>\n Jessica Billy\u2019s parents were present during the sentencing Tuesday, but they didn\u2019t speak. They asked Kemp to read aloud a letter they wrote to Buchkoski.<\/p>\n \u201cWe hope you understand some day what you took from us. You used drugs to be happy and worry free; Jessica paid the ultimate consequence when you put her six feet under,\u201d the Billys wrote in their letter. \u201cThose of us grieving for Jessica, Shadd and his care providers, you left us with grief and suffering.\u201d<\/p>\n Larry Rudick, the father of the crash\u2019s other victim, also spoke during the sentencing. Though the Rudick family didn\u2019t bury a son, \u201che is forever changed,\u201d Pallenberg noted during the hearing.<\/p>\n Still, Shadd’s father spoke on Buchkoski\u2019s behalf. Speaking in between sobs, he recognized that this has been a difficult time for all of the people involved, including Buchkoski, who was 18 at the time of the accident.<\/p>\n \u201cShadd and William are stepbrothers and have grown pretty close over the years,\u201d Larry Rudick explained to the court. \u201cI\u2019ve had the last couple years to watch William struggle to deal with this horrible accident. It is a life changer for everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n [Teen driver in fatal car crash charged with manslaughter, homicide, assault<\/a>]<\/p>\n In the two years since the accident, the Billys haven\u2019t spoken with Buchkoski, nor he with them. He was forbidden from doing so, per court order. Larry Rudick, on the other hand has maintained contact with Buchkoski, whom he said has grown up since the wreck.<\/p>\n Larry Rudick\u2019s testimony left hardly an eye dry. Even Pallenberg had to wipe away tears when Larry Rudick spoke about how proud he was of the way Buchkoski was trying to move beyond the accident.<\/p>\n Buchkoski, too, was emotional during Larry Rudick\u2019s testimony. He has played an important role in helping Buchkoski begin to move past the horrible event that will likely continue to shape his life forever. Buchkoski made this clear during his own testimony.<\/p>\n Since the accident, he said that he has struggled to deal with \u201cthe pain of losing my friend and my stepbrother.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been really hard dealing with the survivors guilt and the PTSD from the accident,\u201d Buchkoski told the court, almost inaudible at times nearly choking as he cried. \u201cI went through times where I couldn\u2019t know what to do or do anything. I just stayed in my room for months at a time. I got to a low point where I couldn\u2019t even look at myself in the mirror anymore. The night terrors kept me up for months at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n After seeing a therapist for six months, the night terrors started to fade, but it was Larry Rudick\u2019s support that helped expel them completely, Buchkoski said.<\/p>\n A sentence that fits<\/strong><\/p>\n Before handing down the sentence, Pallenberg made it clear that his decision only took into account Buchkoski\u2019s actions. The judgment, Pallenberg said, is not a reflection of the extent to which he values the victims.<\/p>\n \u201cI have to decide today what to do about William Buchkoski who was at the wheel when this happened,\u201d Pallenberg explained. \u201cI want to make it clear that I don\u2019t believe that the sentence that I impose today defines what your child\u2019s lives are worth.\u201d<\/p>\n A short sentence wouldn\u2019t be \u201cminimizing the value of your children\u2019s lives,\u201d he said. Likewise, a lengthy sentence wouldn\u2019t be \u201caffirming the value of their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n If that were the case, Pallenberg said he\u2019d impose the maximum sentence allowable, which in this case would be 10 years imprisonment, because the loss that they\u2019ve suffered \u201cis beyond reckoning.\u201d<\/p>\n But if he were to impose such a sentence, he\u2019d be applying the law incorrectly.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was once a law that called for an eye for an eye. That\u2019s not our system of law,\u201d Pallenberg said.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not every year that there\u2019s a fatal accident involving young people who were driving under the influence, but it seems to happen pretty frequently, Pallenberg said.<\/p>\n [Gone too soon: Family, friends reflect on Jessica Billy’s 18 years<\/a>]<\/p>\n During the roughly 34 years he has lived in Juneau, Pallenberg said he has seen more \u201cdevastating\u201d accidents involving high school kids around graduation time \u2014 though he acknowledged this one was a little earlier \u2014 than he cares to count. This is why he chose to give Buchkoski jail time, even though he recognized that the defendant wouldn’t benefit from the sentence.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that the court needs to do what it can to send a message that substances \u2014 whether its alcohol or marijuana or anything else \u2014 and driving don\u2019t mix, and that if a person uses those substances and a terrible accident results, something is going to get done about it,” Pallenberg said. “That person is going to be held accountable.\u201d<\/p>\n Foreshadowing marijuana law changes<\/strong><\/p>\n One of the things that made this case difficult to prosecute and to judge is the lack of precedent when it comes to driving under the influence of marijuana, ADA Kemp told the Empire Tuesday.<\/p>\n Officers recognized that Buchkoski\u2019s eyes were red and watery when they responded to the accident, but they weren\u2019t immediately able to draw blood to test for THC, the mind-altering chemical in marijuana.<\/p>\n By the time they got a warrant to obtain a blood sample, it had been about four hours since the accident, Kemp said. The blood test showed that Buchkoski had 1.7 nanograms of THC per millimeter of blood active in his system. It\u2019s hard to say what exactly that means, though.<\/p>\n \u201cBeing around cases for a long time as a lawyer and a judge, I have an understanding of what .08 might mean in terms of alcohol, but I don\u2019t have a good understanding of what these numbers might mean in terms of marijuana,\u201d Pallenberg explained in court.<\/p>\n Beyond that, Alaska has no legal limit when it comes to THC content. Other states with legal marijuana do. Washington, for example, says that driving with less than 5 nanograms per milliliter of THC is all right. Kemp said that cases like Buchkoski\u2019s will likely determine a need for setting such a limit in Alaska, too.<\/p>\n \u201cMarijuana is something that I think we\u2019re going to have to be able to learn about and deal with because these situations, I suspect, will continue to reoccur,\u201d she told Pallenberg in court. \u201cAnd in light of the changes legally to how we deal with marijuana, I suspect that its frequency might come up even more.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2022 Contact reporter Sam DeGrave at 523-2279 or sam.degrave@juneauempire.com.<\/p>\n Read more news:<\/strong><\/p>\n Changes on the way for Juneau’s Ford dealership<\/a><\/p>\n Sonar cam helps locate fisherman’s body in Auke Bay<\/a><\/p>\n