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Student puddle-splasher may face jail time, fines

December 8, 2000

Apparently, pedestrians are not the only people who need to watch out for puddles these days.

A 20-year-old MSU student may face misdemeanor reckless driving or assault and battery charges for purposely splashing a woman with his pickup truck while driving over a puddle on Oct. 27.

If convicted he could spend 90 days in jail and pay fines of $100 or $500.

The victim, presumably a fellow member of the campus community, never reported the crime and may not even be aware there is a warrant out for her assailant’s arrest.

“The victim wouldn’t have even known it was intentional and just thought ‘Oh, brother. This guy got me, great,’” Ingham County Assistant Prosecutor Sam Smith said.

“She probably just wanted to go home and get dry because according to the witness she was soaked head to toe.”

But Grand Ledge resident Eric Gill did take the time to report the incident.

He had been traveling behind the student when he saw him swerve about five feet off of the road into the puddle that soaked the woman.

He took down the man’s license plate number and pulled up next to him to get a description of the vehicle’s driver, and reported the incident to MSU police.

MSU police Detective Tony Willis said when police contacted the student he told them a bicyclist had been on the road and he swerved to avoid the person, but Gill denied that claim.

“The suspect’s story really didn’t sit that well with the officer,” Willis said.

While Smith admits it is strange for the prosecutor to file a warrant without the victim coming forward, the prosecutor’s office can accept cases from a third party, as it has done in past death cases.

“It is rare to have someone come forward who was not at all involved in the crime but was a witness to it,” he said.

“More often there are 25 or more witnesses who didn’t see anything and are trying to figure out how not to be a witness.”

The charges against the man were originally issued in the beginning of November and prosecutors continue to hope the woman will come forward. This will make it easier to get a guilty verdict from a jury.

Smith said the case will continue to move ahead.

While he believes the case will end in a plea bargain and the student will turn himself in before long, he’d be glad to take the case to trial.

“I don’t have a problem with it at all,” he said.

“It’s one of those really nice cases where we have John Q. Citizen coming forward to report the crime, someone with no ax to grind, but who wants to see justice done. A jury will love that.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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