Eduardo Raul Morales-Soriano

A Howard County Circuit Court judge this week sentenced a 27-year-old illegal immigrant to 10 years in prison for his role in an auto collision that killed an Iraq war veteran and his date on Thanksgiving in 2006.

On May 28, Eduardo Raul Morales-Soriano, 27, formerly of Laurel, pleaded guilty to two counts of negligent manslaughter by automobile.

Judge Louis Becker found Morales-Soriano guilty of the two counts and sentenced him to 10 years on each, suspending the term on one of the counts.

Morales-Soriano agreed to plead guilty to two counts of negligent manslaughter by automobile last September in return for Howard prosecutors asking for a sentence of no more than eight years in prison. Circuit Court Judge Lenore Gelfman, however, ruled the deal inadequate at Morales-Soriano’s sentencing hearing in January and ordered him to stand trial.

The May 28 sentencing, which also came out of a plea bargain, was the result of that order.

Thanksgiving crash

The collision occurred at about 10:20 p.m. on Nov. 23, 2006 — Thanksgiving night — when Morales-Soriano crashed his Nissan Sentra into a Toyota Corolla that was stopped at a red light at the intersection of Route 175 and Route 108, in east Columbia, Howard County police said.

The occupants of the Corolla, Marine Cpl. Brian Mathews, 21, of Columbia, and Jennifer Bower, 24, of Montgomery County, later died as a result of the collision.

Mathews was home on leave at the time. He had served in Iraq from September 2004 to April 2005.

Morales-Soriano registered a blood alcohol level four times greater than the legal limit of .08, according to police. The native of Mexico was in the country illegally at the time, said Wayne Kirwan, a spokesman for Howard County State’s Attorney Dario Broccolino.

On May 14, Howard prosecutor Danielle Duclaux and Bradley Goldbloom, Morales-Soriano’s attorney, agreed to a plea deal that would allow Becker more latitude in sentencing Morales-Soriano than did the September 2007 deal, Duclaux said.

At Morales-Soriano’s sentencing May 28, Duclaux asked Becker to sentence Morales-Soriano to 20 years in prison, noting the defendant’s high blood-alcohol level at the time of the collision.

Goldbloom asked Becker to consider a sentence of no more than eight years, stating that his client had a high tolerance for alcohol and that the case had been unfairly characterized in media reports as "the illegal immigrant vs. the American hero."

In handing down his sentence, Becker said that Morales-Soriano’s high blood-alcohol content and the fact that he was in the country illegally were relevant.

"This court cannot ignore that the defendant has violated the law by his unauthorized presence," Becker said.

Following the sentencing, William Mathews, Brian Mathews’ father, called Becker’s suspension of the second 10 year-sentence "farcical," adding that he did not feel the verdict represented justice for his son.

"There is no winning here," he said.

Morales-Soriano’s family declined comment.

Goldbloom said he was disappointed in the sentence but that he expected it, adding that his client continued to feel remorse for the collision.

Broccolino said he was not pleased with the verdict, but that no verdict would represent justice in the case.

"You can’t resurrect somebody," Broccolino said. "That would be justice,"

Source

"Goldbloom asked Becker to consider a sentence of no more than eight years, stating that his client had a high tolerance for alcohol and that the case had been unfairly characterized in media reports as "the illegal immigrant vs. the American hero."

What in the fuck is it going to take before we U.S. Nationalists say Enough!