CANTON – A former volunteer pastor will spend no time in prison for allowing children under his care to ride on the outside of a church van, leading to the death of 14-year-old.
Rushon T. Patterson II, 27, appeared at his May 20 sentencing, where Stark County Common Pleas Judge Natalie R. Haupt ordered him to pay the maximum $150 fine for the traffic violation, a minor misdemeanor.
An involuntary manslaughter charge, which carried a potential prison sentence of nine months to three years, for the death of Malachi I. Nichols-Williams was dismissed because of a legal technicality.
“It has made me sick since we’ve discovered the error in the indictment, that he’s now only going to be convicted of just this traffic offense, because I do think it demeans what occurred that day,” Assistant Stark County Prosecutor Dan Petricini said during the hearing. “I do think it demeans what he allowed to go on and ultimately what did occur.”
Nichols-Williams’ family did not immediately comment on the sentencing.
Malachi I. Nichols-Williams of Canton dies
Nichols-Williams died Sept. 9 after an accident three days prior.
Patterson was driving an Alive Now Church Ford Econoline van west in the 600 block of Alan Page Drive SE at 8:38 p.m. with multiple children riding on the outside of the van, according to a Canton police report.
When others saw a pothole in the road and jumped off, Nichols-Williams did not get off in time and was thrown from the van, “striking his head on the roadway,” the report said. He lived on the block where he was injured, in the Skyline Terrace apartment complex.
“It’s a horrible situation all around,” said Joseph Patituce, founder and managing partner of Patituce & Associates. “Mr. Patterson feels nothing but regret and remorse for the death of somebody he cared for and as far as the legal system goes, the judge put a lot of thought and effort into her ruling, and she made the correct ruling today.”
Patterson hired Patituce & Associates to represent him after his conviction. His former defense attorney, Jeffrey R. Jakmides, said during the trial that Nichols-Williams was initially expected to survive but complications related to his lungs and his heart contributed to his death.
‘Legal technicality’
In April, a jury convicted Patterson of the traffic offense related to riding on the outside of a vehicle and involuntary manslaughter but found him not guilty of reckless homicide.
Patituce said Patterson’s family hired him to appeal the case after his conviction.
“My firm and I noticed that there was a defect in the indictment that prior counsel had missed, and apparently the state had missed, too,” he said.
As explained during the hearing, state law does not allow involuntary manslaughter to be tied to a minor misdemeanor traffic violation. Other charges could have been considered during the trial, but attorneys agreed that there was no legal way to modify the charges post-conviction.
Haupt said she believed “the jury’s findings would support a conviction for vehicular manslaughter, a misdemeanor of the second degree,” which has a maximum jail sentence of 90 days, but had to limit her sentencing to the traffic offense.
“This is my mistake as the person that brought this indictment,” Petricini said. “I did not see the carve-out until it was too late, although his own attorneys didn’t catch it. It went all the way to a jury trial, and he was convicted.”
Reach Kelly at 330-580-8323 or kelly.byer@cantonrep.com
This article originally appeared on The Repository: Legal mistake helps pastor dodge prison for Canton teen’s van death
Reporting by Kelly Byer, Canton Repository / The Repository
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