Jeff Morey: Outrage over probation in death of a pedestrian

Re “Texting driver who killed 1 teen, hurt 3, gets no jail time” (Page B2, April 11): It is bad enough when there are still scores of men, women, and teenagers who pay no attention to the law regarding talking and texting while driving. But when a San Joaquin County Superior Court judge, namely Ronald Northup, for all intents and purposes lets a woman walk with nothing more than a slap on the wrist for manslaughter, there is something wrong with the criminal justice system and the so-called judges who sit on the bench. It is sickening that Northup handed down an arguably laughable sentence for a crime that killed someone.

Would Northup have handed down that same sentence if the young man who was killed, named Zachariah, was his son? Fourteen-year-old Zachariah Gomez was planning to serve in the military and then become a police officer. Maybe if our so-called judges did their jobs the way they’re supposed to, society wouldn’t be in the mess that it is.

This story was originally published April 14, 2015 at 1:27 PM with the headline "Jeff Morey: Outrage over probation in death of a pedestrian."