Guilty Verdict in Deadly Crash at South by Southwest Festival

A jury started deliberations in the trial of a driver charged with killing four people in a crash previous year at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. To find someone guilty of capital murder, the jury had to unanimously agree that Owens “intentionally or knowingly caused the death of two or more people”.

Owens received an automatic life sentence without parole.

Prosecutors weren’t seeking the death penalty against Rashad Owens, 23.

Police say a breathalyzer for Owens returned a blood alcohol content of.114, over the.

“There is no other answer than that the defendant knew what he was doing – and he didn’t care”, she said, according to the paper.

Meredith Bradley, a witness to the incident, said Monday that Owens drove into crowds gathered on Red River Street at high speeds without regard for the people he was impacting.

‘He didn’t care who was in his way.

“Like Detective Harrington said, you can go through me without even knowing I was there if you are moving fast enough…and we know he was moving”.

“We do not know in that 1-3 seconds when he perceived “Oh my God, these are people” or if he ever perceived it”, said defense attorney Rickey Jones.

Defense lawyers Russell Hunt and Rick Jones described Owens as a young rapper from the small town of Killeen who had been unfamiliar with Austin and had not meant to kill anyone as he fled police.

He had been driving his vehicle without using headlights and hopped a barricade that closed off a street to regular traffic.