Judge rules grief from sons' deaths ample punishment

Thursday, September 09, 2004

BY SUSAN K. LIVIO

Star-Ledger Staff

An East Orange man who accidentally killed his two toddler sons by leaving them inside a car on a sweltering summer day was spared a jail term yesterday by a judge who said locking him up would serve no purpose.

"There is nothing this court could or should do to add" to the suffering Derrick Strothers brought on himself by forgetting the children were in his car when he went to work at the East Orange Post Office.

Calling the case "the hardest sentencing I have had to do in my 18 years on the bench," U.S. District Judge Freda Wolfson set aside federal sentencing guidelines that called for a minimum of six months house arrest. Instead, she ordered Strothers to serve 100 hours of community service and report to a probation officer for one year.

A visibly moved Wolfson said the purpose of punishment is to rehabilitate the offender and deter future criminal acts, but sending Strothers to prison would accomplish neither. "There is nothing to deter. It was an accident. You would take it back in an instant if you could," she said.

Strothers told authorities he intended to drive his children, 2-year-old Derrick Jr. and 1-year-old Dylan, to day care before reporting to work on Aug. 15, 2003. He said he was distracted by cell phone calls while driving, and went directly to the post office as the children slept in their car seats in the back of his vehicle.

Three hours later, fellow employees said they noticed the two boys strapped in their seats and locked inside the 1993 black sports utility vehicle. The outside temperature was near 90 that day. Strothers rushed the children to the hospital but they were already dead.

In May, Strothers pleaded guilty to two counts of involuntary manslaughter. The case was handled in federal court because the deaths occurred on Postal Service property.

In Wolfson's courtroom in Camden yesterday, Strothers, 39, spoke to the judge softly and haltingly through tears.

"I made a mistake. Unfortunately, it cost me my boys," Strothers said. "They were everything. They were my boys. ... I'm sorry."

Strothers was accompanied by more than two dozen relatives and supporters who prayed in the rotunda outside the courtroom before the sentencing, and praised God after the hearing for the judge's compassion. "This is exactly what I prayed for," Strothers father, Rev. Richard Strother said, hugging his family and clutching a black leather-bound bible.

Under federal guidelines, Strothers could have been sentenced to up to a year in prison, one-to-five years of probation and a fine ranging from $2,000 to $20,000. Yet Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Stigall recommended no more than six months of house arrest and probation.

"There is no need to incarcerate this person. He quite feasibly will suffer for the rest of his life," Stigall said.

Strothers attorney, Chester Keller of the federal Public Defender's office, urged the judge to consider the many letters from relatives, co-workers and members of his church pleading for leniency, and sentence his client only to probation. The judge noted that Strothers' wife, Leigh, also wrote a letter to express her unwavering support. "She knows this was a terrible accident."

The most poignant moment came when Strothers' older brother, Richard Strothers Jr., asked the judge to "let me stand in his place" and serve out any prison term. "Me being the older brother, I have to look out for him. Derrick, his wife and the whole family have gone through enough. ... My brother was only trying to do the right thing to raise his family."

Strothers' brother added his hope that one day car manufacturers devise technology to prevent future tragedies.

A national family safety advocacy group is lobbying federal lawmakers to do just that. Janette Fennell, founder and president of Kids and Cars, a Kansas organization that lobbies for laws to prevent car-related child deaths, said car manufacturers have created warning lights and alarms to sound when a driver leaves the keys in the ignition, or forgets to buckle a seat belt. "It would be very simple to add another sensor in the back seat."

Fennell noted heat-exhaustion-related deaths have risen since federal highway officials started requiring children to sit in the back seat to avoid passenger-side airbag injuries. "Of course, kids belong in the back seat, but this seems to be an unintended consequence," Fennell said. "It's very perplexing the government is not jumping all over this."

There have been 27 heat-exhaustion-related children's deaths across the country this year, Fennell said, including that of a seven-month-old boy in Lakewood in May.

The two Strothers boys were among six children in New Jersey who have died from heat exhaustion as a result of being left in a vehicle since 1998, according to state statistics.

"We know this guy did not leave these kids in the car on purpose," Fennell said speaking of the Strothers case. "He literally and tragically forgot."