Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 25, 1993 TAG: 9308250262
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Newport News Daily Press
DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS LENGTH: Medium
Sentencing guidelines had called for a two- to three-year jail term, but U.S. District Judge Robert Doumar said that wasn't nearly enough punishment for causing a crash that injured 74 people.
"What we have here is someone going through an extremely difficult and well-maneuvered plan to make a train loaded with people crash," Doumar said, in an impassioned rebuke. "The maximum sentence in this case hardly seems adequate." Doumar passed sentence after passengers and crew described scenes of terror from the crash, which occurred Aug. 12, 1992, when a tampered switch threw the 79 mph train onto a 10 mph siding.
"I heard a tremendous roar that sounded like the end of the world," passenger Gwendolyn Scharoff said. "All of a sudden, the lights went out, and we were slammed to the right . . . then up and down and back and forth."
"It was real smoky," said another passenger, Susan Schurman, who suffered a gash to her leg. "People were screaming. I was afraid I was going to get trampled." Milton Curtis Womble, the train's engineer, said he was flung through the windshield and slammed face first into a watery ditch.
"I didn't know where I was," said Womble, who has undergone three operations to repair a torn left ear. "I guess I was just lucky it fell onto its left side. Otherwise, I'd have been killed."
Those stories and the injuries of the 70 other passengers warranted a 10- to 12-year sentence, rather than the two- to three-year term recommended by guidelines, said Bornman Assistant U.S. Attorney Mike Smythers.
Doumar took it a step further and handed down a 16-year, eight-month sentence.
"One can't fathom why this offense took place," he said.
Bornman's attorney, Timothy G. Clancy, said his client has asked himself the same question.
He has been trying to figure that out since his arrest, Clancy said, and "he's no closer to that answer now than he was then . . . I would suggest there is no answer," Clancy said.
The former Coast Guardsman wept as he apologized to the victims Tuesday, pausing several times before continuing.
"I have true remorse for what I've done," he said, his voice cracking. "I just let myself get talked into doing something. Now I have to pay the price."
The price could have been worse. Had someone died in the crash, Smythers said, Bornman could have received a death sentence.
Bornman, who turns 20 today, pleaded guilty in June to helping the alleged mastermind of the crash, Joseph Lee Loomis, 19, intentionally derail Amtrak's southbound Colonial by tampering with a switch.
Loomis, who is described as having a deep-seated fascination with trains, is undergoing psychiatric evaluation to determine if he is mentally fit to stand trial. He has confessed to the Amtrak derailment and as many as five other switch tamperings with Bornman's help, authorities say.
by CNB