
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 27, 1990                   TAG: 9005260087
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV1   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: NEAL THOMPSON NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

JAIL TERM PUTS COLLEGE CAREER AT RISK

David Benson, a college student from Roanoke, began serving a four-year jail sentence in Floyd County this month for manslaughter following a fatal traffic accident last year, but there seems to be some confusion over how he is to serve the time.

The rest of Benson's college career may hang in the balance.

Benson pleaded guilty in September to charges of manslaughter and driving under the influence when his car was involved in a head-on collision with another car on U.S. 221 on March 12, 1989. J.C. Waters, 17, a student at Floyd County High School, died in the wreck.

Circuit Judge Kenneth Devore sentenced Benson to four years in jail to be followed by four years of probation and 300 hours of community service.

Devore, however, bent the rules a bit by allowing Benson to finish the academic year at Lenoir-Rhyne College in North Carolina if he served his time on weekends and vacations and returned to jail this month to finish the sentence.

So far, Benson has lived up to that agreement.

He turned himself in earlier this month and is at the Floyd County Jail, said his attorney, Andrew Davis of Bedford.

But now Benson and his attorney have told Roanoke County Commonwealth's Attorney Skip Burkart, special prosecutor in the case, that Benson expects to go back to school in September and return to jail on weekends through the next school year and again next summer.

Burkart said that was not the original agreement.

"It was my understanding that he would go straight through, that he can't go back to school," said Burkart.

Burkart said a hearing may be scheduled next month with Devore to clear up the confusion.

Davis said he had not yet filed any motions requesting a hearing and he declined to discuss the case.

"As far as I know, he's done everything according to the [sentencing] order," Davis said.

According to testimony in previous hearings, Benson reached for a cassette tape and veered into the opposite lane on a winding portion of U.S. 221, striking Waters' car head-on. Tests showed a blood-alcohol level of 0.12, making it the second time in a year Benson had been found to be driving under the influence.

Burkart was assigned as special prosecutor when Floyd County Commonwealth's Attorney Warren Lineberry disqualified himself because Waters is his secretary's brother.

by CNB