There is frustration and anger in the US as a driver who killed a cyclist in a hit-and-run, the repeat offender’s fourth texting while driving collision, is set to be released from prison having served two-and-a-half years of a nine-year sentence.
The family of Benjamin Montalvo called the situation “completely outrageous” and expressed their disbelief at the early release in an interview with the LA Times. Neomi Velado killed Montalvo while texting her boyfriend in June 2020 and was sentenced to nine years in prison. However, she is set to be released this month having served less than a third of her sentence.
“How can you do this, be a repeat offender, kill somebody and serve two-and-a-half years of a nine-year sentence?” Kellie Montalvo, Benjamin’s mother, asked.
Velado was convicted of felony vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and felony hit-and-run causing death, in relation to the collision which killed 21-year-old Montalvo as he cycled in Corona, California.
It emerged Velado had already been in four at-fault crashes prior to killing Montalvo, three of those involving mobile phone use behind the wheel. Reports in the US suggest she is eligible for early release having earned good behaviour credits during her time in prison.
Ahead of her sentencing in 2023, a court heard that when she hit and killed Montalvo on 11 June 2020, Velado “demonstrated callousness of leaving a boy in the street to die”.
“Quite frankly, we don’t give a darn about her good merit credits,” Benjamin’s mother said. “Where are Benjamin’s credits? Where are his milestones? She took every milestone that he could have ever achieved when she killed him.
“The system has let us down and we don’t want that. There are going to be more future victims, and if we don’t speak up and use our story for the greater good, then who’s going to do it?”
The Montalvo family is now campaigning to add gross vehicular manslaughter and vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated to the list of violent felonies that are not eligible for more than a 15 per cent early release via good behaviour. Non-violent offenders can earn up to a 50 per cent reduction, or 66 per cent through wildfire firefighting credits.
The corrections department has not commented on how Velado acquired sufficient credits to be eligible for release approaching a third of a way through her sentence. It has only been reported that the date was determined based on credits for good conduct and for 124 days served in custody before imprisonment.
13 thoughts on “Anger in US as hit-and-run driver who killed cyclist in fourth texting while driving crash to be released from prison early”
A 9 year sentence is already a joke for this incident.
Add to that it wasn’t her first phone driving crash.
And then to be released early…
Sheesh.
USA, tell us You care about cars/driving more than people’s lives without telling us…
She looks like shes smirking in that photo. Absolute scumbag that should have got a lot longer in the first place and shouldn’t be remotely eligible for early release. Shes shown repeatedly that she can’t be trusted and has learned nothing.
I find the whole idea of earning credits in prison absurd at the best of times. Good behaviour? What are you going to do in prison unless you really are a hardened criminal. Your opportunities for criminal behaviour in most cases is nil. Its like patting someone on the back for not crashing their yacht when they don’t own one.
In principle, a sane person might think
“No. You don’t get let out early for good behaviour. You do the WHOLE sentence for your BAD behaviour.”
Crazy, car-centric California! I would be willing to bet that her license was not revoked and, at worst, all she would have to do is renew her license if it had expired (they are good for 5 years in California). And what do you need insurance for if you have nothing to protect and don’t care about anyone else! The same applies to drunk driving! 3, 4, 5, 6, or more DUI’s? No problem, here is your license back! Killl someone on your FOURTH reckless driving (or DUI)? It’s not murder, it’s just an oopsie!
An awful story. How on earth did she get her licence back or any insurance after the first two collisions?
Unfortunately phone use whilst driving is endemic. Just look around. If I could enforce instant confiscation of a vehicle for mobile phone use at the wheel, I would.
It would appear that the US legal system trains drivers to believe that phone driving isn’t a serious offence, by not punishing them effectively for their first, second and third crimes. Presumably, she got the proverbial slap on the wrist for the first offense, so was not deterred from doing it again and again and again until she killed someone.
If a system of punishment isn’t doing it’s most fundamental purpose, then it needs to be changed, in this case from a slap on the wrist to something that actually hurts, like immediate confiscation of the vehicle for a week. I’ve seen lots of videos of US cops having cars towed for relatively minor offences, so why not phone driving?
Can we have the edit function back please?
Seconded. Also I wouldn’t mind the ability to comment on some articles (live blog the other day refused to recognise I was logged in). The quote feature wasn’t bad either…
I found that when I logged in from an article it would return to the home page (now logged in), but if I navigated back to the article it wanted me to log in again
If I refreshed the page at that point, it would log me back in (or at least show that I was).
It would be nice to be able to share pictures to illustrate comments again as well.
And another example of a lenient sentence:
“Driver jailed after causing crash that killed two
… jailed for six years and eight months for causing two deaths (and many injuries)
… less than a month after passing her driving test.
… previously admitted two counts of causing death by dangerous driving and causing death by driving whilst uninsured.
… 96mph in a 60mph zone
… she attempted to overtake three vehicles at once while travelling at 96mph, before trying to abort the manoeuvre and hitting the taxi.
Simon Stirling, defending, suggested Mitchell’s actions were a result of “inexperience rather than irresponsibility”.
He added that Mitchell had only passed her driving test three weeks earlier and would not have understood the risk of the manoeuvre she was attempting.
Gloucestershire Police said an analysis of Mitchell’s social media found that she had been filming Snapchat videos while behind the wheel.
These videos showed her “lack of care for driving safely”, police said, with one showing her veering onto the opposite side of the road towards an oncoming car as friends shouted for her to stop.
Mitchell must serve half of her sentence in custody before being eligible for release on licence.
She has also been disqualified from driving for eight years and four months, must undertake an extended driving test to regain her licence, and was ordered to pay a statutory surcharge.”
War on drivers?
But cyclists.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3ew3vp8dlzo
This is a mockery of justice. Sounds like her family had a friend in the right place.