As noted in the Ludington Torch via the reportage of Allison Scarborough of the Mason County Press:

LUDINGTON — Michigan State Police Trooper Sammy Sidney Seymour, Jr., was found guilty, Feb. 5, 2016, in 79th District Court of operating an ORV while impaired.

Initially charged with operating while intoxicated, which requires driver’s license sanctions, Seymour’s sentence for operating an ORV while impaired does not include any driver’s license sanctions.

Seymour’s sentence includes one day in jail with credit for one day served; outpatient treatment, which his court file indicates he has completed; $870 in fines and costs; 93 days discretionary jail for one year; and his ORV privileges are suspended for 90 days...

Testimony during the trial never referenced an ORV. A voicemail inquiring about the case left at Mason County

Prosecutor Paul Spaniola’s office has not been returned.

 The facts of the January 2015 incident were previously explored in the LT during the time  when Seymour drove his Jetta home after drinking to the point where he later blew a .14 BAC at the local police station.  He endangered not only himself, but also his girlfriend and sister, she who had the privilege of being arrested and assaulted by MCSO Deputy Mike Fort.

The video speaks for itself, LPD and MCSO sheriffs reports concur, that Seymour was driving drunk, and that he was driving a motor vehicle.  So why is he now being charged with operating an ORV while impaired, and having his ORV privileges suspended for that incident?

Prosecutor Spaniola does not have the power to alter the facts within his prosecutions.  If Seymour had been charged with murder, and the corpse and all the other evidence pointed to his guilt, the prosecutor shouldn't be able to charge him with animal cruelty.  So let's take a look at the record before this crazy charge of others who have been tried in 79th District Court by Paul Spaniola for the offense of Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) in vehicles and see the general pattern of what happens. 

At around the same time last year, when Seymour was caught, the record showed the following:

These continued through the year with pretty much the same routine sentencing, the next two snippets come from the MCP for two weeks in December 2015 and in January 2016:

It appears that when you have been found to be DWI in Mason County the penalties are fairly standard, with slight variance for if there are other factors:

1)  Times served in jail (usually 1-2 days)

2)  Discretionary jail time up to 93 days

3)  Around $1000 in court costs, fees and fines

4)  Attending Victim Impact Panel (VIP) and/or AA meetings

5)  Random PBT and drug tests

6)  No Alcohol/Drugs for a period

7)  Conviction reported to the Secretary of State (SOS).

The last three do not apply to him, rather he has a three month ban of using an ORV, which he may not even own or use, and which definitely had no part in the actual crime. 

What made Prosecuting Attorney Paul Spaniola decide to plea Michigan State Police Sammy Seymour with a totally bogus charge of a crime that wasn't committed and receives lesser punishments than what he has bargained for with numerous other drunk drivers throughout just this last year?   The simplest conclusion is the right conclusion-- it is the 'professional courtesy' that Trooper Seymour asked arresting officer Steve Wietrzykowski for, but failed to receive. 

Back in April 2014, the MSP honored Prosecutor Spaniola with an award, in which they explained that Paul had done excellent work in prosecuting the Trooper Butterfield assassination by Eric Knysz.  Spaniola could have been totally incompetent and prosecuted that case successfully, what the award was for had more to do with Paul not charging MSP Trooper James Luttrull with the murder (or anything else) of retired school teacher Bill Marble in his home in January 2014.  He is well poised for getting another award this April.

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It wasn't a "professional courtesy" from Spaniola and his two assistant prosecutors. Spaniola could not accept that he lost during Seymour's trial with the hung jury! Spaniola and his assistants wanted to take Sammy's case to the Appellant Court, which would draw the case years into the future. By doing this it would cost the taxpayer's of this county lots and lots of cash flow, plus Sammy's attorney's via Sammy's pocketbook.

For all those naysayer's of Sammy getting "professional treatment," it is farther from the truth. Spaniloa knows he did not stand a chance! He laid on his back like a crying baby and agreed to what was offered by Seymour's legal team. No "professional courtesy," Just Mason County's inept Prosecutor's office bowing to a legal team that obviously is more legal savvy than weasel boy Spaniola!

Spaniola needs to go in the upcoming election.

I agree with most of your analysis, but I think Spaniola would have gone to the bitter end of appeals if the defendant was not a state trooper, and never accept the DWI ORV charge.  That bit of ugly politics did play a factor, in my analysis of the situation and psychologies of the men involved.

Speaking of which, another excellent article by Allison Scarborough, defense-attorney-cites-zealous-prosecution-in-troopers-impaired-dri..., gives additional perspective from the defense; Prosecutor Paul was still not available for comment, probably hiding in a corner somewhere muttering something about losing his "precious".

There are some factors that go into plea deals.  I am guessing Seymour had a high paid attorney that had some fear in Spaniola feeling confident to win the case in a SECOND trail.  Also, how many of those cases you posted attempted to fight their drunk driving case?  

It is not like he had it pleaed down to a ticket or something.  He still has a misdemeanor by the looks of it.

If it would have went to a trial, AGAIN, in front of a jury who is made up of all of us and he won, everyone would be crying that he got off free and wasn't offered any sort of punishment.  People are offered plea deals in a lot of cases, but its not published like this due to his profession.  I believe the biggest part of this would be him having a good attorney.  How about we stop acting like we all are lawyers and know what happened with the case.  

Good points, RT, he was given a misdemeanor and faced an uphill battle by going up against quality lawyers and a no-nonsense trial court for any remands made in appeals courts.  But as can be noted by Facebook attorneys  and local pundits, it belies an underlying problem with our justice system when you can plea to be guilty of something you never did. 

It underlies the problem Jasper talks about, where the prosecutor piles on specious charge after charge so that he has more bargaining chips to plea with court-appointed attorneys who run their clients through the justice mill with rugged efficiency.

 

I'm not lawyer but I don't think a mistrial can be appealed at the appellate court level because a mistrial is like a + and - cancelling each other. In essence the trial was a non trial because no verdict was rendered and to correct that situation another duplicate trial is required. X, am I wrong about that?

My understanding is that when a hung jury is involved to create a mistrial, the state usually does not retry the case unless they can present good reason to disqualify parts of the original trial that led to the hung jury-- otherwise you're dealing with double jeopardy.  The ruling by Judge Nellis which declared certain parts of the tests were admissible (when Judge Wadel said they weren't) helped the prosecution be able to retry the case.

Beyond that it was plea bargaining.  I believe Spaniola wanted to 'win' something, Seymour didn't want more trials and tribulations, neither wanted a harsh sentence for the trooper, so a deal was reached, and the inappropriate charge had the 'right amount' of punishment for their compromise. 

Theoretically any vehicle that uses a State designated ORV trail needs a state issued ORV permit. 

Snowmobile, dirt bike, 4x4, Jetta?

Maybe Sammy had the ORV sticker for his Jetta.  You know, just in case of an emergency. 

Like this situation. 

So what you are reporting now that after a year later drunk in the VW Jetta, they retried this now as an ORV incident? I don't get it! Wth does an ORV DUI have to do with this? It sure sounds like they totally scuttled the DUI to a much lesser offense. No SOS reporting? I'd like to see anyone else in this county get away with this obvious beyond imagination DUI as a regular citizen, and have the same results! Professional courtesy is exactly what this ending is imho, and Real Talk, no one has to be a bufoon attorney to see thru this kind of BS plea and sentence. Try not to be one of the naysayers always sticking up for the supposedly good guys. When they get caught doing illegal activities, they should face the same punishments as ALL the rest of the PUBLIC! But sadly, they NEVER DO! Just another warped ending for a story about the "good ole boys club" with public officials covering for one another, sameo cheat on true justice.

An ORV has nothing to do with a Jetta, but its what they plead to.  I am not saying he is a good guy, nor am I sticking up for him one bit.  But if you follow the court news in Mason County or any other County in the State, you see plea deals all the time.  If you have a great attorney, then plea deals are common in a lot of cases.

You see plea deals in assault cases all the time where they plea it to disorderly or something along those lines.  Seymour still got a misdemeanor in this case.  I am sure there are people in Mason County who have had drunk driving charges dropped before as well, but its never published like this case.  The reason this case is so widely published is due to Seymours job title and rightly so.  If this was a teacher or joe blow, everyone would be content with it and saying, well at least he or she got some sort of punishment.  There obviously was something the attorney was fighting where Spaniola was afraid or on edge about taking it to a SECOND trial.

I wouldn't really look at this as a Professional courtesy.  Professional courtesy would be the Sgt from LPD not arresting him and giving him a ride home, wouldn't you?   I would applaud that Officer for doing his job and arresting Seymour.  I feel Seymour put him in a very rough position and he did something that was probably very tough to do to someone in his profession. Professional Courtesy doesn't really apply to the Prosecutor.

How was this ending in the "good ole boys club?" Also, how was any of this covered up? He was arrested, he went in front of a a group of jurors made up of all of us and it was a hung jury.  So they appealed it in front of another judge to attempt to get him convicted and came up with another misdemeanor charge to charge him with instead of going in front of another Jury an have him potentially found not guilty.  If that would have happened then you would be saying, the Prosecutor botched the case and should have offered a plea deal to find him guilty of something.

Plea bargains are not a luxury, they are essential for the Court System to operate smoothly. If every offender asked for a jury trial the Courts would be backed up for years and many cases would have to be dropped against the defendants because they did not receive a "speedy trial". I have to agree that Spanolia was not showing professional courtesy.

I guess we can all sit here and make excuses, interpretations, split hairs and atoms about the case. The bottom line may be that some form of justice was served, I'll just say it was weak and an incompetent one imho. Also not a true charge for the case at hand, but a desperation plea and charge. Perhaps the misdemeanor alone will get him fired now anyhow, so there is some justice if that occurs. The fact remains however that this wouldn't have been the same ending for 99.9% of John Q. Publics involved. And if he keeps his position with the MSP, then what should we all think?

Today's Mlive headline says it all "State trooper back on road after plea to impaired driving of 'ORV' - really a car"

The negotiated plea deal let Sammy Seymour Jr., 42, keep his driver's license without restrictions. He is back on road patrol while an internal investigation is pending, according to a department spokeswoman...

"This case was vigorously litigated," [Prosecutor] Spaniola said. "We were prepared to try the case a second time. Our intention was always to treat him as any other similarly situated defendant, no better and no worse.

"With the rulings of the court as to the admissibility of the evidence collected in this case, I believe that we did so in the end," Spaniola said.

The best part is the replies to the story, where the commenters recognize that the state of the justice system, is mostly 'system' rather than 'justice'.  A cop caught drunk driving to the extent that Seymour tested at, should never be out on road patrol ever again unless it's in a mall parking lot. 

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