According to the Boston Globe, on May 16, 2009, 18-year-old Jonathan Caruso struck and killed a woman who was walking her dog and seriously injured her daughter. After drinking at an all night post-prom party, Caruso was driving home and fell asleep behind the wheel. He then drove off the road and hit and killed 67-year-old Carol Marean and seriously injured her daughter. Caruso carried minimum automobile liability insurance, which does not cover the $400,000.00 in unpaid medical bills for the surviving daughter.
On March 23, 2010, he was sentenced to 2 ½ years in the Essex County House of Correction with 6 months to serve in jail and 4 years probation after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor count of motor vehicle homicide by reckless operation. He will also be required to speak to 10 middle and high schools describing how he was responsible for Carol Marean's death. Judge Michael C. Lauranzano, who decided on the sentence, said the case was among the toughest of his 10 years on the bench.
Caruso was initially charged with operating under the influence, but those charges were dropped when a chemical breath test given two hours after the crash showed his blood alcohol level was .02, below the legal limit. A blood test performed 10 hours after the crash showed no signs of alcohol.
A victim impact statement by one of the deceased daughters said that Caruso knew that he should not have been driving -he told police he had 10 beers in the hours before the crash - but chose to do so anyway.
Pedestrian injury attorneys at Bellotti Law Group, P.C. handle similar pedestrian injury cases in the Boston, Massachusetts area.
