South Dakota lawmakers vote to halt impeachment against attorney general

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

PIERRE, S.D. (Reuters) - The South Dakota House of Representatives voted on Monday to halt impeachment proceedings against the state attorney general over his conduct in a fatal car crash last year while he still faces unresolved criminal charges from the accident.

The lawmakers voted 57-11 vote to suspend further impeachment action against the state's top law enforcement official, Republican Jason Ravnsborg. The move marks a sharp turnaround after both Democratic and Republican politicians had called for his ouster.

The clamor reached its peak last month after state authorities took the extraordinary step of releasing video of police interrogations of the attorney general and other evidence from the Sept. 12 crash, in which his car struck and killed a man walking along a highway.

In the video, Ravnsborg told police he believed he had run into a deer, rather than a person, until he returned to the scene the following day to find the body of the victim, 55-year-old Joe Boever, lying in a roadside ditch.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/south-dakota-lawmakers-vote-halt-033657026.html

[lagomorph777]

1. Good thing he didn't vote against Trump - he'd be out on his ass.

[Dreampuff]

2. I'm confused

If he thought he had run over a deer, why did he return the following day? I don't know the history of this, but he did he have alcohol or drugs in his system or was he even tested?

[UpInArms]

3. The dead man's glasses were inside his car

[Jilly_in_VA]

4. The guy

is lying his azz off, and they are going to let him skate. I hope he gets primaried next time around by someone who's at least halfway honest, even if they are Repugnican. In SD that's about the best you can hope for....halfway honest.

[abqtommy]

5. When I lived in South Dakota I met many caring and competent people. It's obvious that

none of them got elected to the state House Of Representatives!

[TwilightZone]

8. Elected officials are more conservative than the general populace.

It's all relative, of course, but that's been true for a while now. They're managed to elect a bunch of nuts, but Trump was actually underwater in the polls in SD for a while in the last couple years of his admin. The state isn't quite as rabid as the legislature and governor would make it appear.

[aocommunalpunch]

6. *insert maniacal laughter here*

They won't impeach?! What does this guy have on them?

[marble falls]

7. It all boiled down to "who here has not never drove drunk in South Dakota". He knew long before ...

... he went back he hit someone. He'll never spend a moment in the can and there will be an NDA. In a couple of years he'll run for Governor.

[TwilightZone]

9. He could get hammered in a civil lawsuit...

He could get hammered in a civil lawsuit, though I'm sure he can afford good lawyers.

A lot depends on if it's determined he was on official business. If so, the family would have to sue the government, similar to the Janklow case years ago (GOP Rep. and former governor ran a stop sign and killed a motorcyclist). Janklow's case was settled for $1 million in 2008.