How much faith can one have in a court system that frees an Orlando, Florida woman, who by all evidence was partly or entirely responsible for the disappearance and subsequent murder of her own two year old child, then convicts a mother in the death of her 4 year old who was struck and killed as the mother jaywalked with her three children across a busy street while trying to get home?
Raquel Nelson, the 30 year old, Marietta, Georgia pedestrian was convicted of reckless conduct, improperly crossing a roadway and second-degree homicide by vehicle, while the driver of the van who killed Nelson’s son and injured the mother and another child, admitted that he had been drinking and using painkillers before getting behind the wheel got six months on a hit-and-run charge. What they hey???
After more than 125,000 people joined in an online petition campaign asking for mercy, Judge Kathryn Tanksley handed Nelson a year’s probation, ordered 40 hours of community service and offered her a new trial.
The suburban mother who appeared on NBC’s Today’s show twice this week said, “There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to go through this again,” then added that she is weighing her options.