Teenager driver's attack with car caught on video

From http://www.heraldtribune.com/

Zack Bell was hit from behind and tossed into the street as his shoes flew off. He got up, momentarily looked at the car's headlights and ran off, barefoot and bleeding.

The teenager ran to a neighbor's house for help, but he got no answer. He sprinted to a convenience store and called his mother, who drove him to a hospital.

That Bell survived, state prosecutors say, is incredible. That the crash was caught on video is extraordinary. A homeowner's surveillance camera recorded the wreck that night in September.

The crash, authorities said, was not an accident but an intentional, violent act stemming from an argument. There were no witnesses. The video, central to the prosecution's criminal case, showed it all.

"This was a hideous crime. This was attempted murder," Bell's mother, Barbara Shaffer, said Saturday. "This girl didn't punch my son in the face. She tried to kill him."

Katelyn Horne, 17, the girl who intentionally rammed her car into Bell, pleaded guilty last week to aggravated battery and will be sentenced to a year in the Manatee County jail next month. But one question remains: should Horne become a convicted felon?

Horne's mother does not think so, saying the jail sentence is enough punishment. She said her daughter is not a violent person.

"It's going to be a hard thing for her," Tammy Jo Horne said. "This has been a very sad thing for everyone."

Horne's attorney, Joe Campoli, said he will push for leniency. Horne had no record before this case. Now, she will spend a year locked up. College is on hold. When she gets out, Horne must serve 18 months of probation and 50 hours of community service. Campoli called the crime an isolated incident.

Making Horne a felon will have a greater negative impact on her life than the year in jail, Campoli said. Getting a job as a felon is not easy. Felons are often shunned in the community as untrustworthy.

Campoli thought Horne should have been prosecuted in juvenile court. For serious, egregious felony crimes, prosecutors routinely put teenagers into the adult criminal arena — exposing boys and girls to harsher punishments than in juvenile court.
Shaffer, the victim's mother, said she was disappointed Horne will not serve a longer stint of probation. Shaffer said Horne deserves to be a convicted felon.
Ultimately, the decision whether to make Horne a felon is in the hands of Circuit Judge Diana L. Moreland.

Bell, 19, is recovering from his injuries, which included a cracked vertebrae, his mother said. He still has back pain.

Authorities said Bell was cut up badly after being down the night of Sept. 14 in the 5000 block of Third Avenue West in Bradenton.

Authorities said Horne, who lives in the neighborhood, pulled up to Bell, who was walking in the street, according to sheriff's reports. Bell, his mother said, was walking home from the football game at Manatee High School.

Horne stopped and exchanged words about Bell's younger sister. Bell said Horne drove past him and then turned around.

The Buick that Horne was driving went onto the sidewalk and struck Bell from behind, throwing him about four feet into the road. The car slammed into a utility pole after striking the teenager.

Bell told investigators he thought he was about to be hit a second time.
A neighbor, Joseph Scott, 42, has cameras trained on the front of his house. The cameras, he said, were installed to capture thieves. Scott heard the crash, which temporarily knocked out power to his home.

He said Bell took off into the night. "He was running full-blast," Scott recalled.
Horne returned to the crash scene with her mother, Scott said. The girl said she swerved to miss a person who had walked in front of her car.

Sheriff's deputies confronted Horne at her home, but her parents told her not to talk to the investigators.

"I only wanted to go to Manatee to watch the game," Horne said, according to sheriff's reports.

That Friday night, Manatee High School's football squad defeated visiting rivals from Southeast High School in front of some 7,000 fans on the home turf in Bradenton.

Horne was jailed that night, and a video of the crime was placed into an evidence locker at the Manatee County Sheriff's Office.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• surveillance
• hir
• and
• run
• attempted
• murder
• bradenton

[iggyiggyx]

Who cares if it was her first offense. She tried to kill the guy with her car. I hope they make her a felon.

[numbereightyseven]

Her mother says she's not a violent person.

WRONG.

A violent person is someone who commits a violent act, like trying to kill someone by running them down with a car.

Her attorney says it will have too negative an impact on her life.

WRONG AGAIN.

It will teach her that what she did was wrong, that threatening someone's life makes you rightly lose your freedom, and suffer being locked up.

NO WONDER SHE'S SCREWED UP. LOOK AT HER MOTHER AND ATTORNEY.

[datboiikeezy]

I dont know WHAT the herald is talking about but tbey DEFINATELY got facts WRONG

[datboiikeezy]

Well allll of u dont know what ur talkin about b/c my cousin IS a felon b/c of that AND she got 5 years of felony probation... So keep talkn out ur ass :)) .........

[mechaart]

a year?

nah

make it 10 years

revoke her license

put her as a felon

and also make the mother of the teen pay for his medical bills

and maybe while no ones home tow her vehicle away and destroy it and get rid of the license in a vat of acid.

my two cents

[Lostpaladdin]

i love how they included the results of the HS football game LMAO aww priorities =o)

[randomness845]

@numbereightyseven Parents are almost always naïve and unwilling to see reason when it comes to their kids. Attorneys on the other hand are paid to be naïve. That's what's wrong with society.

[MrBuzzoro]

#87, I totally agree with you, Every bit of it, Lock her ass up !!!!!!

[kineticdeath]

@limowreck27 not to mentiopn flee the scene afterwards. Attempted murder AND fleeing the scene makes it stand out heavily as premeditated, even if she planned to run him down only 5 minutes beforehand. She should be served the full extent of the law, not juvie law either. She wanted to act mature by driving she can cop the mature cost for law breaking

[thenailfactory]

@MrKorbske wow. 

[Holden308]

She may not be a violent person to her mother but running someone over with your car doesn't exactly make you a candidate for Humanitarian of the Year.....

Put simply it was a violent act and if she wasn't a violent person as her mother blindly believes, she wouldn't have done it. But is making her a felon the answer? In this case yes because in a rush of blood she tried to kill someone. That alone makes her a violent person IMO.

[VandQand3and0]

wow, sprinting with a cracked vertebrae. crazy