Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 3, 1995 TAG: 9505030036
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Short
Curtis David Taylor, 35, of Lakeshore Trailer Park, was sentenced last week in Pulaski County Circuit Court to serve three years of a seven-year term after he entered an Alford plea Thursday to a charge of involuntary manslaughter, according to court records.
An Alford plea puts one's punishment in the hands of a judge rather than giving a jury the chance to set a possibly harsher penalty. Alford pleas allow defendants who believe they are innocent to acknowledge that prosecutors have evidence that would likely lead a jury to convict them.
Taylor had been scheduled to go on trial today. He was indicted last November in the September 1994 death of Demarco Franklin Gillespie, 37, of Pulaski County. The accident happened on Dora Highway as Taylor was driving east, apparently at a high speed. Police said the car came upon a barricade at the closed end of Dora Highway and Taylor lost control of the car, which went off the road and flipped several times.
Gillespie sustained serious head injuries after he and Taylor were ejected from the car. Gillespie died about a week after the wreck.
by CNB