Again in 2021, Britt Reid, then the Chiefs’ linebackers coach and son of celebrated Kansas Metropolis Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, left staff headquarters drunk, smashed his truck into two automobiles stopped on the facet of the interstate at 84 mph, and put a five-year outdated Ariel Younger right into a coma. Younger sustained a traumatic mind damage, and 5 others, together with Reid had been injured within the crash. Two hours after the incident, Reid’s blood alcohol content material was nonetheless .113.
When regulation enforcement arrived on the scene, Reid informed officers he had two to a few drinks along with taking his prescription Adderall. Although police say they noticed apparent indicators of impairment, Reid was taken to the hospital for surgical procedure on his groin and was not arrested.
Reid wouldn’t be arrested for a full two months, whereas native cops “investigated” the crash. As a lawyer who regularly represented individuals accused of driving drunk, I can guarantee you that that’s not how issues usually go. DUI arrests, that are massive enterprise for some municipalities due to the convenience of prosecution and the heavy fines imposed, are extra of an “arrest first and ask questions later” crime, and by no means as soon as in all my time in DUI court docket did I come throughout an individual who triggered a crash with severe accidents who wasn’t instantly arrested and, generally, handcuffed to their hospital mattress.
In the course of the time cops and prosecutors had been dilly-dallying with the son of the Chiefs head coach, Ariel Younger fought for her life in a hospital. Her household created a Go Fund Me to offset the astronomical price of her medical payments and the care she would probably want for the remainder of her life. Greater than a yr later, Younger’s mom, Felicia Miller, described how Ariel’s life had been perpetually modified.
“Her daughter drags her right foot when she walks and will soon see a doctor about leg braces. Ariel has poor balance. She’s in special education classes because she takes longer to process information. She also wears thick glasses that she didn’t need before.”
In November of 2022, Britt Reid eventually plead guilty to 1 felony rely of drunk driving (which is way much less a cost than what I’ve seen individuals equally located to Reid hit with, and which Ariel Younger’s household didn’t imagine was sturdy sufficient), and sentenced to a few years in jail, although the crime with which he was charged carried a sentence of as much as seven years, and if there was ever a case of aggravating circumstances, this gave the impression to be it.
And now, including insult to damage, Missouri Governor Mike Parson has commuted (i.e., shortened) Britt Reid’s sentence, saying, “Mr. Reid has completed his alcohol abuse treatment program and has served more prison time than most individuals convicted of similar offenses.”
I can inform you for a proven fact that, whereas which may be true in Missouri, it’s definitely not true for different locations within the nation, the place DUI’s (particularly these involving severe damage) are sometimes charged as a lot increased crimes and the defendants sentenced to for much longer phrases in jail. One legal website described the penalty for DUI assault in Missouri, which happens when one other individual is injured as the results of a DUI, as a cost that carries as much as 15 years in jail. Injuring 5 individuals, as Britt Reid did, might have probably meant 5 costs of DUI assault, every carrying a person sentence of as much as 15 years.
What’s worse, the commutation was accomplished over the obvious objection of Ariel Younger’s household, whose lawyer told the Daily Beast, “The family is disgusted, I am disgusted, and I believe . . . that the majority of the people in the state of Missouri are disgusted by the governor’s actions. If you drink and drive and you put a little girl in a coma, you should have to serve the entire sentence that a judge of this state gave you.”
“But wait! It was a mistake! Britt Reid has been through treatment and deserves a second chance!” you say. However Britt Reid has already had a second probability. He was convicted of a previous DUI in 2008. That point, he served 5 months in jail for that offense along side a road-rage incident the place he brandished a gun at one other driver.
And Britt Reid just isn’t the one Reid son to have run-ins with the regulation. In November of 2007, whereas Andy Reid was teaching in Philadelphia, his son, Garrett Reid, was additionally sentenced to jail for a DUI crash that injured one other driver. Based on police, Garrett Reid had heroin and greater than 200-pills in his automotive on the time of his arrest. He then additional confronted costs that he tried to smuggle roughly 90 prescription capsules into jail the identical week he was sentenced. During a sentencing hearing, the choose in Garrett Reid’s case in contrast the coach’s residence to “a drug emporium” and questioned whether or not his grownup sons ought to dwell there. “There isn’t any structure there that this court can depend upon,” the choose mentioned earlier than sentencing Garrett to as much as 23 months in jail.
Garrett admitted that he favored the standing of being a drug seller, telling a probation officer in 2007, “I favored being the wealthy child in that space and having my very own high-status life. I might go anyplace within the ‘hood. They all knew who I was. I enjoyed it. I liked being a drug dealer.” Garrett Reid was found dead in his dorm room at Eagles training camp in 2012.
If you’re questioning why you haven’t heard this earlier than, it’s as a result of the NFL media appears to have a bizarre aversion to asking Andy Reid questions on something apart from what he likes to eat and who his favourite rappers are. In 2023, USA Today’s Jarrett Bell wrote in regards to the surreal Tremendous Bowl press convention, the place Andy Reid, solely months after Britts’ arrest, was requested questions on how he takes his espresso, his favourite cheeseburger, and to call his three favourite rappers. Nobody requested about his youngsters’s historical past of recklessly injuring individuals or how they maintain winding up on his staff’s payrolls. However hey, Andy Reid has a humorous mustache and wears Hawaiian shirts, so I assume that’s adequate.
If Britt Reid just isn’t Andy Reid’s son, he’s arrested instantly for DUI on the scene of the horrific accident brought on by his ingesting at staff headquarters. If Britt Reid just isn’t Andy Reid’s son, he’s sentenced to a a lot lengthier jail sentence. And if Britt Reid just isn’t Andy Reid’s son, his sentence for injuring 4 individuals and placing a five-year outdated woman in a coma just isn’t commuted by Missouri’s governor. Andy Reid’s silence all through all of it is craven and inexcusable. The media’s refusal to power him to remark, in the end, is equally as unhealthy.
Households who battle with habit deserve our grace and assist. There however for the grace of God and all that. And definitely, rehabilitation and restoration needs to be on the forefront of our prison justice system in relation to dealing with addicts. However when different individuals are injured as the results of an addict’s actions, particularly a younger baby, the addict have to be held to account, as ought to those that enabled the addict’s habits and, due to this fact, the ensuing damage. NFL coaches reply laborious questions for a dwelling. It boggles perception that Andy Reid hasn’t been pressured to talk out within the wake of the harm brought on by his youngsters, which — if one choose is to be believed — originated in his residence.
Deadspin reached out to the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs and Andy Reid for remark. On the time of publication, that they had not responded to our request.
