No prison time for taxi operator in Westmoreland crash that claimed five lives

Westmoreland taxi operator Delroy Rodney, who pleaded guilty to the deaths of five passengers in a crash on the Bluefields main road in 2023, has escaped prison time.

Rodney was sentenced this afternoon in the Westmoreland Circuit Court by High Court Justice Courtney Daye to 18 months imprisonment on each of the five counts, which are to run concurrently.

However, the sentences were suspended for three years, meaning he would not have to go to prison. 

Additionally, he was ordered to pay $500,000 on each count to the surviving families of the five victims, totalling $2.5 million.

The sum must be paid by March 31. 

As part of his sentencing, Rodney is not allowed to hold a driver's licence for the next three years.

Daye, during sentencing, noted that while the maximum sentence for causing death by dangerous driving is five years imprisonment, Rodney was given a reduced sentence due to his early guilty plea, his expression of remorse, and his previous clean criminal record.

Rodney was arrested on November 15, 2023, two days after the Toyota Noah motor vehicle in which he was transporting passengers collided with a Shacman truck along the Bluefields main road in Westmoreland.

The five persons who perished in the crash were 15-year-old schoolgirl Lavecia Forrester and her 39-year-old mother, Petrina Wallace, of Gordon district in Whitehouse; Oneil Allen and his mother, 65-year-old Angela Samuel, of Mount Edgecombe; and 54-year-old Janet Thompson, of a McAlpine address.

Rodney was represented by attorneys Lambert Johnson and Faith Salmon at his sentencing hearing.

- Christopher Thomas

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