California: A young Minnesota man was sentenced to four years in prison for killing his girlfriend, Indian American business student Ria Patel, in a drunk driving incident last year. Hennepin County, Minnesota District Court Judge Fred Karasov sentenced Michael Laurence Campbell, 21, to four years and four months for killing Patel on Sept. 17, 2017. Campbell was intoxicated as he careened into a stop light in northeast Minneapolis. He fled the scene on foot.
Police arriving at the scene were able to free Patel, 20 at the time of her death, from the car and provide medical aid until paramedics arrived. The youngster nevertheless died from massive head injuries.
On March 14, a Hennepin County jury found Campbell guilty of three charges: two counts of criminal vehicular homicide - one for the crash, the other for leaving - and for a lesser charge of leaving the scene of an accident not caused by the driver that resulted in a death. Campbell had a history of offenses, including several instances of speeding, underage drinking, and using marijuana. Judge Karasov listed Campbell’s 12 past driving offenses before he delivered the sentence.
Campbell stood before the court and apologized. He said he loved Patel and wanted to spend his life with her. “Every time I looked into her eyes I fell more in love with her,” he said, acknowledging that the young woman’s death was his fault, and that he would have to live with the memory of that fatal night for the rest of his life.
Campbell maintained throughout the trial that the accident was the result of a passionate kiss delivered by Patel, which caused him to take his eyes off the road. But a jury rejected his “passionate kiss” defense.
Karasov said that Campbell was grossly negligent and noted that he left the crash site as Patel was dying, and did not come forward when police began a search for him. The judge said he believes that Campbell loved Patel but the kiss defense was irrelevant. He called it “an excuse.”
Campbell was sentenced to 52 months for the first charge, minus the 199 days already served. Karasov did not deliver a sentence on the other two charges, but he did apply a sentence remaining on Campbell’s unfinished court business stemming from a 2016 hit-and-run case and connected probation violation - 90 days - which reduced the 199 days already served to 109 days.
