SANTA ANA, Calif., Sept. 14 (UPI) -- The man whose minivan crashed into a car carrying Nick Adenhart, killing the Los Angeles Angels pitcher, didn't commit murder, the man's lawyer said Tuesday.
Defense attorney Jacqueline Goodman, making opening statements in the Santa Ana, Calif., trial of 22-year-old Andrew Thomas Gallo, told jurors that while Gallo did indeed cause the deaths of Adenhart and two others in the April 2009 crash, the incident didn't constitute murder, the Los Angeles Times reported.
"He did it, and he has to live with that for the rest of his life," Goodman said. "But Andrew Gallo is not a murderer."
Orange County prosecutors have charged Gallo with three murder counts in the deaths of Adenhart, 22, Courtney Stewart, 20, and Henry Pearson, 25, in the accident, in which Gallo was charged with being drunk and running a red light.
A fourth car passenger, Jon Wilhite, 25, was critically injured.
"What happened on that night, when all those kids met in that intersection … was something that captured the heart of Orange County," the Times reported Goodman as saying. But, she added, "we don't have a murder."
