Do Wrong Way Cop’s passengers bear partial responsibility?

"This was a very, very, very strong odor."

Those were the words of a paramedic testifying before a jury as to the overwhelming stench of alcohol coming off Pedro Abad as they fought to keep him alive. Pedro Abad is the former Linden Police officer who went partying with three friends and ended up at Curves strip club on Staten Island until closing. He left the club and drove the wrong way on West Shore Expressway. It is said that the so-called 'black box' from his car indicated he was driving 73 mph and never even hit the brakes when he drove head-on into a tractor trailer, killing two of his passengers and leaving another and himself terribly injured.

According to NJ.com, the paramedic, Lauren Hartnett, testified that the smell of alcohol filled the entire ambulance. His blood alcohol level was said to be three times the legal limit. His lawyer's attempt at claiming strippers had slipped him GHB failed when no trace could be found in testing. Abad had a history of drinking and driving. This was indeed an accident waiting to happen, which brings me to my point.

The two dead men, Joseph Rodriguez and Frank Viggiano, chose to get in the car with Abad. Viggiano was a fellow Linden officer and surely knew of Abad's history of alcohol abuse yet chose to ride with him. Rodriguez made the same choice that night. Abad turned down a plea deal that called for a 21 year prison sentence. If convicted at trial he could get 25 years. Is that too steep a sentence when the only victims were complicit in the drinking that went on that night? One could argue their judgment was impaired so you can't fault them for making the choice to ride with a drunk driver. But if you make that argument, you have to be consistent and argue that Pedro Abad was not responsible for his own actions for the same reason. So I cannot and will not make that argument.

Had the victims been a completely innocent party; a family for example that was in the wrong place at the wrong time, I can understand a quarter century in prison. The fact that these 'victims' put themselves in that very wrong place at that time of their own volition makes me see them as slightly less sympathetic.

But only slightly. Abad is a creep. I have said it many times. He arrogantly was seen at the very same bar where that night started with these charges hanging over his head, drinking yet again. Only not driving that night. Yet if you killed two people and still didn't get the wakeup call to stop drinking, you're not taking anything you did seriously. He has tried to wriggle out of responsibility at every turn. He absolutely deserves jail time. A lot of it. I just feel when the very victims were the ones partying with him chose to and place themselves in a car with a drunk driver there should be a small mitigation, not of guilt but of sentencing. Perhaps two years worth. Furthermore, when one of the victims was a fellow officer and did nothing to stop his friend from driving drunk his own sense of duty to his job has to be at least questioned.

Let us know what you think.