A judge has denied a hand-written request for a shorter or nullified sentence from Breanna Stewart, who is serving a two-year prison term for vehicular manslaughter.
Stewart, 20, is the local woman who was convicted last year of vehicular manslaughter in the death of Ryan McFall, a 2006 graduate of San Benito High School.
A judge in September sentenced Breanna C. Stewart, the driver in the January 2012 car crash on Union Road that killed the 23-year-old McFall, to state prison.
She pleaded with the judge in a hand-written letter written from prison, asking for a shorter sentence, or a release on probation or parole. The judge in the case last week found “no basis” for her request and denied it, according to court records.
Stewart wrote that she is committed to reconnecting with “goodness and decency.”
“I’ve accepted responsibility for my actions,” she wrote from prison, “accepted powerlessness over my punishment and have begun to let this whole experience humble me by the pain I’ve felt and continue to feel, transforming it into compassion, peace, and simplicity.”
Stewart, 20, pleaded no contest in August to the “vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated” charge against her in connection with the Jan. 14 car wreck at Union Road and San Benito Street. Judge Steven Sanders handed down the two-year prison sentence, which was the mid-term penalty for such a vehicular manslaughter conviction.
The accident occurred around 3 a.m. Jan. 14, 2012, as the two were returning to Hollister from Tres Pinos. The car, a 2009 Hyundai Sonata, was westbound on Union Road when Stewart lost control and crashed into a light pole at the intersection of San Benito Street, according to the California Highway Patrol, which investigated the case.
The car was severely damaged on the front-right side and all along the right side. McFall, a 2006 graduate of San Benito High School, was dead before responders arrived.
The CHP arrested Stewart at the scene and later alleged she had a blood-alcohol level over the legal limit of 0.08 percent. Stewart accepted the no contest plea – which serves the same purpose as a guilty plea when it comes to a sentence – at a preliminary hearing.
She was committed to authorities for incarceration after her sentence hearing in September and had one day credited for time served.
McFall was born in Edinburgh, Scotland. Before his death he had moved to Sacramento, where he was studying electrical engineering at American River College.
