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Nearly a week after the South Dakota attorney general was charged with three felts for fatally striking a pedestrian on a freeway last year, the South Dakota governor called on him to resign and released investigative interviews that detail the incident, and state lawmakers have begun impeachment. lawsuits against him.
Jason Ravnsborg, 44, has been charged with driving a motor vehicle using a mobile device, lane violation and reckless driving following the September 12 crash. Ravnsborg was not on his cell phone at the time of the impact, but was out of the traffic lanes, state lawyers said, when he struck the victim, 55, Joseph Boever, on American Highway 14, about a mile west of Highmore. , South Dakota. The accident did not qualify for manslaughter, they said.
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem called on Ravnsborg to step down following Tuesday’s accusations.
“Now that the investigation is closed and charges have been laid, I think the attorney general should resign,” she said in a statement.
Noem also published on Tuesday two interviews lasting more than three hours in total that law enforcement officials conducted with Ravnsborg in the days and weeks following the fatal incident. The governor said she had reviewed the material and encouraged “others to review it as well.”
During the interviews, Ravnsborg reiterated that he did not know what he had hit on the dark road, but assumed it was a deer “because there would be else.” He said he called 911 and looked around a ditch with a cell phone flashlight, but did not find Boever’s body until he returned the next day to examine the debris.
Investigators urged Ravnsborg on his cell phone use while driving on Highway 14 that night. They also informed the attorney general that a pair of Boever’s broken glasses had ended up inside his car, going through the windshield, according to interviews published by Noem.
“His face was in your windshield, Jason. Think about it,” one of the investigators said.
A distressed Ravnsborg replied that “it pains me to hear very much”.
Investigators also wondered how Ravnsborg could have ignored Boever and his flashlight, which they said was still the next day.
“It’s really hard to miss when you’re there,” said one of them.
In response, Ravnsborg said, “Obviously I’m not as careful as I should be.”
An investigation completed a month after the accident first determined that Ravnsborg was distracted when he collided with Boever with his 2011 Ford Taurus. But last week state prosecutors said that at the time of the crash impact, Ravnsborg was not a distracted driver based on an analysis of two cell phones he carried.
In a statement, the Ravnsborg spokesman said the attorney general “has no intention of resigning”.
“At no point did this issue hamper his ability to do the work of the office. Instead, he addressed some of the biggest regulations and legislative issues the state has ever gone through,” the statement said. “As a lawyer and lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserves, AG Ravnsborg has fought for the rule of law and personal freedoms and hopes to be accorded the same rights and courtesy.”
While the state released the videos of the interviews, state lawmakers also initiated impeachment proceedings against the attorney general. The resolution, tabled Tuesday and presented to the South Dakota State Capitol House on Wednesday, includes two articles of impeachment and charges that Ravnsborg be removed from office “for his crimes or misdemeanors in power that caused the death of Joseph Boever “.
Rep. Will Mortenson, who tabled the resolution, said it was “the most difficult decision I have ever made”.
“My heart is breaking for all parties involved in this matter, but now is the time to do the right thing, however difficult and uncomfortable it is,” he said on social media.
The resolution is now awaiting its first committee hearing. The Ravnsborg spokesperson told ABC News that they have yet to be able to review the full document.
Ravnsborg, who was elected in 2018, was not put on administrative leave and continued to work after the accident.
The attorney general has a series of previous conduct violations, according to state records. He pleaded guilty to speeding six times between 2014 and 2018 and paid fines of between $ 19 and $ 79, according to state records.
ABC News’s Karma Allen, Joshua Hoyos, Julia Jacobo, Jennifer Leong and Ivan Pereira contributed to this report.
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