Dunbar man sentenced for DUI crash
A Dunbar man was sentenced to one to five years in state prison for driving while intoxicated the night his pickup truck struck and killed a Fayette County man in Georges Township in 2007.
Earlier this month, a Fayette County jury convicted Edward E. Weimer, 50, of drunken driving but acquitted him of the more serious homicide by vehicle charge in the Dec. 22 death of Jonathan Anderkovitch.
The panel also acquitted Weimer of aggravated assault while DUI for his role in the crash on Wynn Road.
Judge Ralph C. Warman sentenced Weimer on Wednesday to the prison term after hearing an emotional statement from Anderkovitch’s grandmother, Mary Ward.
“The only difference between you and Jonathan that day is that Jonathan was drunk and walking on that road and you were drunk and chose to drive. He paid with his life for his mistake,” Ward said.
Weimer had a blood-alcohol content of .186 percent, more than twice the legal limit.
Anderkovitch had a blood-alcohol content of .24 percent, had marijuana in his system and was likely walking in the middle of the road when Weimer’s vehicle struck him.
Ward talked about Anderkovitch’s young son who was left without a father following the crash and also about how the family has struggled to survive.
She also detailed Weimer’s convictions for DUI in the past, including a prison stint in the mid-1980s for homicide by vehicle while DUI.
“When does it stop? When will you learn? I will never forgive you for what you’ve done to our family,” Ward said.
During the trial, Assistant Public Defender Jeremy Davis argued that jurors would have to believe that Weimer’s alcohol consumption caused the accident for a conviction on the homicide by vehicle charge.
“The cause of the accident was not his alcohol consumption. It was an accident. The cause of the accident was a pedestrian walking in the middle of the road in his (Weimer’s) lane of travel,” Davis said.
Davis also noted that state police found that Anderkovitch was at fault, and told jurors that Trooper Matthew Alekson initially only charged Weimer with DUI until the county’s former district attorney had him file the additional charges.
Assistant District Attorney Phyllis A. Jin argued prosecutors never accused Weimer of intentionally killing Anderkovitch.
“This was an accident, that’s true, caused by this man — a drunken driver,” Jin said.
When handing down his sentence, Warman told Weimer that while his record cannot be used to determine the gravity of his crime in a legal sense, it cannot be ignored either.
‘There has to be some impression made upon you that you cannot drive after consuming alcoholic beverages,” Warman said.