Court records have shown that Ethan Couch had a blood-alcohol content of 0.24, more than three times the legal limit for an adult, when he slammed into four people who’d stopped to assist a stranded motorist June 15 alongside a narrow Tarrant County road. All four pedestrians were killed, including a mother and daughter, and two of Couch’s friends were thrown from his pickup and severely injured.
Ethan Couch and his friends had stolen beer from a nearby Wal-Mart store before the crash, prosecutors said. According to Raw Story, The teen’s attorneys never denied that Couch was driving the pickup or that he’d been drinking underage, but they argued that his parents should be held responsible for their son’s actions because of the way they’d raised him.
Eric Boyles, who lost his wife and daughter, told CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360” on Wednesday night, “lets face it … There needs to be some justice here.” The Texas judge agreed with the defense attorneys’ claims that the 16-year-old, Ethan Couch, who killed four people while driving drunk, had been given whatever he wanted by his wealthy parents and had never learned to accept responsibility for his actions.
According to a CNN affiliate, a psychologist called in by the defense described Couch as a product of “affluenza.” So the judge sentenced him to 10 years on probation, setting aside the prosecutors’ request for a 20-year prison term after the teen pleaded guilty last week to four counts of intoxication manslaughter and two counts of intoxication assault causing serious bodily injury.
Judge Jean Boyd ordered the teen to undergo therapy at a long-term, in-patient facility, and his father offered to pay more than $450,000 a year for therapy at a rehabilitation center in Southern California. If he violates the terms of his probation, the teen could be sent to prison for 10 years.
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