Criminal Justice
Driver in Fatal David Halberstam Crash Gets 5 Days
Posted Feb 15, 2008, 01:59 pm CST
By Martha Neil
A five-day jail sentence has been given to an aspiring journalist with a bad driving record who was at the wheel when author David Halberstam died last year in a California auto accident.
Under a recommendation by the sentencing judge, Kevin Jones, 27, is likely to serve the time in a work-release program, picking up trash or performing similar tasks, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. He pleaded no contest last year to misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter.
San Mateo County Superior Judge Mark Forcum imposed the sentence following a written plea for leniency by the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist's daughter, who says her father's death left a hole in her life but he would not have wanted Jones to be jailed.
Jones, a graduate student at the University of California at Berkeley, was also given two years of probation, must take a driving course and is being required to perform 200 hours of community service helping youngsters improve their reading and writing skills, the newspaper explains. His driver's license has been suspended for one to three years.
Halberstam, 73, died in April after Jones took a left turn in front of an oncoming vehicle as he sat in the passenger seat of Jones' car, wearing his seat belt. As discussed in an earlier ABAJournal.com post, his many books included The Best and the Brightest, and he is also known for his work as a civil rights reporter.