A jury convicted defendant of two counts of first-degree aggravated manslaughter, N.J.S.A. 2C:11-4(a), two counts of second-degree vehicular homicide, N.J.S.A. 2C:11-5(a), one count of third-degree possession of gamma hydroxybutyrate (GHB), N.J.S.A. 2C:35-10.2(a), and one count of third-degree possession of gamma-butyrolactone (GBL), N.J.S.A. 2C:35-10(a)(1) and (3). The State contended defendant was the under the influence of GHB and had not slept for more than twenty-four hours when his car slammed into the back of another car stopped at a toll booth at Exit 14C of the New Jersey Turnpike at more than fifty miles per hour. The driver of the other car and his five-year-old daughter died as a result. The judge imposed an aggregate thirty-seven-year term of imprisonment, with a twenty-seven-year, two-month, and eleven-day period of parole ineligibility.
The court rejected defendant's challenge to the admissibility of the statement he gave to State Troopers while hospitalized the morning after the accident and after he was given his Miranda rights. Defendant contended, in part, that detectives failed to inform him that two people died in the crash, telling him only that they were investigating the accident, before he waived his rights. The court distinguished the facts from those presented in State v. Diaz, 470 N.J. Super. 495 (App. Div. 2022), which was filed before the Court issued its opinion in State v. Sims, 250 N.J. 189 (2022), reversing our earlier decision in that case.
The court reversed defendant's convictions for aggravated manslaughter, however, finding it was plain error for the judge to not provide ins tructions on second-degree reckless manslaughter as a lesser-included offense of aggravated manslaughter. The court rejected the State's argument that any error was harmless, given the jury's guilty verdict on the two vehicular homicide counts, noting the judge never explained the heightened degree of recklessness required to convict defendant of aggravated or reckless manslaughter committed by driving a vehicle, versus the element of recklessness required to sustain a conviction for vehicular homicide.