Both attorneys agreed it was a sad situation all around — a stupid mistake that cost an 18-year-old Vancouver man his life, and would forever alter the life of the friend responsible.
Ryan J. McGuinness, 22, had been drinking when he used his 1992 Subaru Legacy to mimic a skateboarding maneuver just before losing control of his car and causing a fatal rollover crash on Aug. 16, 2014.
The crash, on the Southeast Mill Plain Boulevard exit from northbound Interstate 205, killed London D. Stoll, who was riding in the backseat with three other friends. Stoll was thrown from the vehicle and pronounced dead at the scene.
On Thursday, McGuinness of Vancouver was sentenced in Clark County Superior Court to four years in prison after pleading guilty to vehicular homicide — operating a vehicle in a reckless manner. He initially faced the same charge under a more serious prong: DUI.
He reportedly failed a field sobriety test administered after the crash and had a blood alcohol content of 0.11, Senior Deputy Prosecutor Kasey Vu said.
However, the charge was altered as part of a plea bargain.
McGuinness and Stoll were part of a group of six friends who had seen the premiere of a theatrical performance about skateboarding the night of Aug. 15, 2014, according to a probable cause affidavit. Vu said the friends are skateboard enthusiasts.
Afterward, they went to a bar in Portland to have some drinks, court records said. McGuinness drove the group back to Vancouver at about 3 a.m. north on I-205 when he took the Mill Plain exit at freeway speed. His passengers asked him to “slap the rail,” which is a skateboarding term for bouncing the wheels off a curb, the affidavit said.
When McGuinness started to jerk the steering wheel side to side, he lost control. The Subaru went off the road and rolled on its top, according to court records.
Two of the four people in the back seat, including Stoll, were ejected from the vehicle. No one sitting in the back was wearing a seat belt.
The other passengers in the vehicle were Trevor D. Ward, then 22; Blake T. Rounds, then 18; Garret R. Kavanaugh, then 18; and Marcus J. Allen, then 21, all of Vancouver, according to Columbian archives.
During the sentencing hearing, Vu said McGuinness used “poor judgment” and gave into peer pressure. He acknowledged Stoll’s family who were in the courtroom and said they are “clearly still distraught.”
Victims advocate Mary Todd read a statement on behalf of Stoll’s family. The family said they hope that after McGuinness serves his sentence he would be willing to participate in a school education program to discuss safe driving.
McGuinness’ defense attorney, Jon McMullen, said if his client could go back in time and do things differently, he would.
“There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about (Stoll),” McGuinness told the court. “I wish things could go back to the way they were.”
He tearfully apologized to Stoll’s family.
Judge Scott Collier said he would accept the attorneys’ recommendation and sentenced McGuinness to 48 months, a longer-than-normal sentence based on the plea agreement.
Collier said McGuinness would have faced five or more years if he had gone to trial, though he acknowledged no amount of prison time would bring Stoll back.
After the hearing, some of Stoll’s family members hugged McGuinness before he was led out of the courtroom.
