No jail time in deadly car-pedestrian case

Sixth District Court judge Rebekka Stumme called it the most “remarkable” victim impact statement she’d ever heard, after Brandon Westby asked the judge to be lenient. Westby’s father, Justin David McNeil, died after being hit by 21-year-old driver Brent James Keranen on March 21.

“As a Christian, I reflect on the many examples of forgiveness found in the Bible,” said Brandon Westby. “My father was a devoted Christian. With that in mind, I forgive the young man [sitting] here.”

Stumme listened to Westby — and also spent weeks pondering her decision — then stayed a four-year prison sentence for one count of criminal vehicular homicide, dismissing three others. Now 22, Keranen will be on probation for 10 years. She also sentenced him to 150 hours of community service, working with Mothers Against Drunk Driving or a similar organization by testifying during their victim impact panels. He also can’t drink, go to bars, take any mood-altering drugs except by doctor’s order, and must comply with every probation order for the next 10 years, including random searches, urine analysis, mental health therapy and treatment for substance abuse.

Stumme said she granted the dispositional departure because Keranen had been accepted into an intensive drug and alcohol treatment court and program, was very remorseful and had “a unique amount” of family and community support.

“I believe all those things together will result in you being a better person and the community a safer place,” Stumme said to Keranen. “I don’t think I can say the same thing about prison.”

Had he been sentenced to prison, she said, he would have been finished with his sentence and probation in four years.

The crash

Keranen, who grew up in Pengilly, near Hibbing, was driving back to his hometown after drinking late into the night with friends in the Twin Cities area. He was so out of it that he fell asleep and grazed a Minnesota State Patrol trooper’s vehicle while leaving the metro area that morning. The trooper checked his blood alcohol level: it was at 0.066, under the 0.08 legal limit. He issued Keranen a citation.

Assistant Carlton County attorney Michael Boese said Keranen was on notice to take himself off the road after that, but he didn’t.

“After the accident, he kept driving north … and definitely used some alcohol and cocaine or methamphetamine,” Boese said, piecing the day together.

“ … He enters Moose Lake, completely leaves the roadway and causes a very serious horrible accident.”

Boese asked for the presumptive sentence of four years in prison, according to state guidelines.

“I get that people make mistakes, but not all mistakes are equal,” he said. “Mr. McNeil paid the price in this case, and there has to be a sanction.”

In addition to Westby, Moose Lake corrections employee Erica Sandberg gave a victim’s impact statement. She spoke of driving away from work and thinking there was a dead deer by the road, when she saw two shoes, pointing in different directions. Sandberg and several fellow corrections employees stopped at the scene, and she tried to resuscitate McNeil. She spoke in great detail of giving the fatally injured man chest compressions, how hard it was to give up, even after EMTs said they were calling the time of death. She remembered sitting on the side of the road and suddenly realizing she needed to go pick up her children from school. The trauma of what she experienced haunts her, vivid images in her mind every time she passes a dead deer on the side of the road or goes through the four-way stop near where it happened.

Keranen should be held accountable, she told the judge.

“He didn’t steal some money, he killed a man,” Sandberg said.

Asking for leniency

Sandberg was the only person other than the prosecuting attorney who didn’t ask for leniency for Keranen. Five people — a former Nashwauk police chief, his high school baseball coach, both parents and his aunt — spoke on behalf of Keranen. All said he accepted responsibility for what happened and has been working incredibly hard to change his life.

His mother said he is suffering, doesn’t eat or sleep enough and cries a lot in the aftermath of the crash. Others talked about his character, his leadership on and off the baseball field, how he stood up for kids who needed it as a young person. Nearly 15 other people wrote letters about Keranen as well as his tight-knit family, as part of the court documents the judge reviewed.

Keranen also addressed the courtroom, sharing deep remorse. The only option he saw after the crash was to turn his life around “for me and for Justin McNeil,” he said.

He had quit his job in the aftermath, cut off the crowd he’d been hanging around in the Twin Cities and changed his line of work. Instead of being an electrician, he now wants to be a firefighter, dedicated to serving the community like his father.

Keranen expressed deep sympathy for McNeil’s family.

“I don’t blame his loved ones if they have a feeling of hatred toward me, because I would too,” he said, talking about how lost he would be without his own father, who was there in the courtroom.

“I prayed that one day you would forgive me … today is that day, so, thank you,” Keranen added, turning toward Westby.

In addition to the Christian belief in forgiveness inspired by Jesus, Westby told the court he also reflected on the tragedy through his own lens as a father and a U.S. Army veteran who did three tours of duty and suffered from PTSD.

“As a soldier … each day I confront echoes of what I’ve experienced,” Westby said. “He, too, will carry the weight of his actions and the remorse that comes with it.”

Westby met his own father for the first time when he was 5; he didn’t grow up with McNeil, and got to know him better in high school and later, when McNeil found him on Facebook. A hoped-for visit didn’t happen before the crash that killed the 61-year-old, who was walking back to his apartment from the Dollar Tree store.

Young people make mistakes, Westby said. As a father of two girls, Westby said he would ask for compassion if his own daughter made a mistake.

Human factors

Judge Stumme, like Westby, didn’t think a prison sentence was the right path. She explained that Minnesota district court judges must consider state sentencing guidelines, but they are granted leeway to consider the “human factors” as well as the wishes of the victim or

their family when imposing a sentence.

The “safest” thing she could do would be to send him to prison for four years like the numbers say, she said.

“But that ignores the human factors,” she said, pointing out that Keranen was 22 years old with no criminal history and an “undeveloped frontal lobe.”

“We don’t need to send Mr. Keranen to prison to change his behavior,” she said. “He will be the force to change [that].”

The way he can honor Justin McNeil is to live a happy and safe life, she said.

Stumme also stayed a year of local confinement until a June review hearing, noting that she wanted the threat of that confinement plus prison to help keep Keranen headed in the right direction.

“I want to hear good reports from every single person you’re working with,” she said. “I will continue to suspend that (local confinement) if things are going well. I don’t want to interrupt your treatment.”

Although devastated by his father’s death, Westby said he was hopeful for Keranen in the courtroom.

“I hope we can look forward to him becoming a positive member of society,” he said.