Nicole Linton’s family have some questions around what appears to be inconsistencies as to whether vehicular homicides are charged as murder or as vehicular manslaughter in Los Angeles.
From what I have come to understand, there has never been a case where a person with no prior convictions, no history or record of reckless driving, or not under the influence of drugs or alcohol was ever charged with murder stemming from vehicular homicide. So the question that I would like to have answered is “why is Nicole being treated so differently?”
Apparently, there have been some people involved in very horrific accidents—in some cases worse accidents—where more victims are hurt or killed or the person was intoxicated. And in those cases, there were never any allegations or evidence that they had mental illness at all. And in a lot of those cases, those people were not charged with murder yet, Nicole, someone who no history of dangerous driving and suffering from a mental illness is facing murder charges.
One example is a vehicular homicide case from 2003 in Santa Monica where 10 people were killed and 70 were injured. The driver in that case was not charged with anything for 6 months and then only with manslaughter. He was allowed to remain on his own recognizance and even after he was convicted at trial, he did not have to serve a single day in jail. Similarly, in 2008 in Eagle Rock a street racer killed 5 people and was only charged with manslaughter.
Again, why is Nicole being treated differently? Are we saying a mentally ill person that does the same exact thing as a healthy person is more responsible? It should actually be the opposite—it should be that if you do the same act with a sound mind, you are more responsible.
Nicole is right now in jail without bail because of these murder charges. I suspect that had she just been charged with vehicular manslaughter, we would’ve been able to bail her out and she would be in a psychiatric treatment facility right now getting the treatment that she desperately needs; but instead, she has been sitting in a jail potentially deteriorating.
On the Saturday night when they were booking her, we were positive that she was going to get a Vehicular manslaughter charge and the bail would be set to something like $300k. But then we heard from the bail bondsman that they were actually going to charge her with Murder and the bail would be set at $2Million. Minutes later, the bail bondsman called me again and said it was actually going to be $9 million. Even he was in complete shock and said he’s had serial killers post bail at $2 million dollars. We went from thinking we would be able to get her out the next day and place her in a psychiatric facility to her not even getting bail.
There are just too many inconsistencies and I really need someone to tell me what makes Nicole’s case so different? Why is it that one of the most compassionate people I know, someone who dedicated her life to helping people and suffering from a mental illness is being charged with murder?
I hope we can get some answers and that the court will apply the law to Nicole fairly and equally.