Anchorage Daily News

Timothy Wood, who hit and killed a woman while driving stoned on the Seward Highway, was sentenced to three years in prison Friday for criminally negligent homicide and driving under the influence. He has already served the time awaiting his sentencing hearing.

Wood, 33, will also lose his license for five years.

His blood tested positive for marijuana after his Chevy Blazer crossed the center line, slamming into a Subarbu Forester driven by 53-year-old Diane Bahnson in 2005. Bahnson lived in Girdwood and was heading home after vacationing with her parents in Sacramento. Wood was injured and flown by helicopter to the hospital. Bahnson was killed.

Troopers said Wood was driving erratically before the accident.

Wood was originally charged with second-degree murder, but technical problems with the blood test evidence made it hard to take the case to trial, according to prosecutors. In a plea agreement, his charge was reduced to criminally-negligent homicide.

Bahnson's parents and husband came to Wood's sentencing hearing, sitting at the prosecution table. They urged Superior Court Judge Philip Volland to give the stiffest sentence possible under the agreement.

"I believe Mr. Wood has gotten away with murder," Bahnson's husband, Reid, told the judge. "He destroyed not only one life, but many."

When it was time for him to speak, Wood apologized to the family. Not a day goes by, he said, that he does not think about what he has done.

Volland told the family that he gave sentence that was fair given recent similar sentences for similar crimes. No sentence could make up for what they had lost, he said.

"There's nothing I can do to bring back a life."

Find Julia O'Malley online at adn.com/contact/jomalley or call 257-4591.

ADVERTISEMENT