UPDATE (2:37 p.m.) - Derrick Chavers, 38, who was originally charged with two counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault, was found guilty of two counts of manslaughter and one count of aggravated assault.
Greene County Circuit Court Judge Kathy King sentenced Chavers to 20 years on each manslaughter charge and ordered them to run consecutively to one another. Chavers was sentenced to another 20 years for the aggravated assault charge, which will run concurrent to the other charges.
In total, Chavers will serve 40 years in the custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections.
“Chaver’s decisions that night are nothing short of devastating," District Attorney Angel Myers McIlrath, said. "The victims’ families are left without these cherished young men and Chaver’s own family is now devastated by his actions."
Christopher Smith, who was injured in the accident, said a fight had broken out at the party and that a group of them had gone outside to separate themselves from the commotion.
"The next thing we know, we just get hit by a side-by-side," Smith said. "He hit my brother first on the left side of the road, he turned and hit me on the right side of the road. After he hit me, he ran over Levi Lewis."
Chavers, a 35-year-old man at a "party of teenagers," told the judge he only attended the party when he drove by and saw someone he recognized from work.
"Why would a grown man want to be at a teenager's party?" King said. "The one person out there with a fully developed brain was [Chavers.]"
King said she doesn't think Chavers intended to run over anyone that night, but that his judgement was impaired.
LEAKESVILLE, Miss. (WKRG) — A Lucedale man convicted in a deadly 2020 ATV crash received a hefty sentence as well over 100 people crowded the Green County Courthouse.
Greene County Court Judge Kathy King has sentenced 38-year-old Derrick Chavers of Lucedale, the suspect involved in a 2020 ATV crash that killed two people and injured one, to 60 years in prison.
In December 2021, Chavers was charged with two counts of homicide and one count of aggravated assault. According to previous reporting, he then made his first court appearance and was given a $250,000 bond.
During today's trial, prosecutors and defense presented their arguments.
King said that the crash — which killed Wesley Smith, 17, and Thomas Lewis Richton, and injured Wesley's brother, Christopher Smith — happened after a party.
Chavers, who was 35 then, "left a party full of teenagers," King said.
He had two underaged girls in the ATV with him at the time of the accident and, according to prosecutors, Chavers blew a .177 on a breathalyzer, which is twice the legal limit.
The speed limit on the road is 25 miles per hour, but Smith estimated Chavers was going at least double that.
The defense asked the judge to put Chavers on house arrest, and prosecutors asked for the maximum sentence.
As for Christopher, all he has are memories.
"We were always together, and we were inseparable basically," the survivor said of he and Wesley. "Just memories I have with my brother and also future memories I can't make with my brother..."
0 Comments