DUI driver gets longer jail term
An Allegheny County judge on Friday rescinded the lenient sentence he gave a man who killed an Irish dancer in a drunken-driving wreck, because the man never told the judge about an earlier DUI conviction.
"I don't believe you should profit from that deception," Common Pleas Judge David Cashman told Joseph Livoti, 27, of Indiana, Indiana County.
Cashman sentenced Livoti yesterday to three to six years in prison for the death of Margaret Brohan, 19. The judge originally had accepted a plea agreement that could have given Livoti a year in prison, followed by a six-month stint at a boot camp.
When he sentenced Livoti on Feb. 3, Cashman took into account letters from the victim's family expressing appreciation for the remorse Livoti showed. Livoti, however, failed to mention that a day earlier in Indiana County, he had pleaded guilty to another charge of driving under the influence.
Livoti had a blood-alcohol content of 0.198 percent on Nov. 12, 2003, when his pickup truck crashed into the passenger side of a Volkswagen Jetta outside the entrance to The Mall at Robinson. The legal limit for driving is 0.08 percent.
Brohan, of Ennis, Ireland, was sitting in the back seat on the side of the impact. She died at the scene. Two others in the car were injured. The car was filled with members of the dance troupe Rhythm of the Dance, which had performed at Mullaney's Harp & Fiddle in the Strip District earlier in the evening.
More than six months later, on May 23, police in Indiana County spotted Livoti driving without headlights and arrested him. His blood-alcohol content was 0.144 percent.
Brohan's mother traveled from Ireland to attend yesterday's hearing so the judge would know the family no longer believed Livoti's expressions of remorse. She declined to talk with reporters.
"To say the least, the family was devastated by the news of the second drunken-driving conviction," Allegheny County District Attorney Bruce R. Beemer said during the hearing. "Their belief is there has been a change in circumstances."
Cashman said he found the second drunken-driving incident "absolutely, positively incomprehensible."
Livoti's lawyer, Sumner Parker, said he believed Livoti was truly remorseful and would not relapse again. Parker said he knew firsthand the carnage caused by drunken drivers because his 16-year-old brother was killed by one more than 20 years ago.
"I do have a problem," Livoti, shackled in handcuffs and leg irons, told Cashman. "It's been a problem for a long, long time."
Then, heaving with sobs, he told the judge: "I would gladly have taken her place."
