A Columbia County man has been sentenced to nine years in prison for a 2021 wreck that took the life of a Martinez nurse.
Robert A. Stanley, 54, pleaded guilty to first-degree vehicular homicide, driving under the influence of drugs and failure to maintain lane.
He was accused of veering into the opposite lane of traffic July 11, 2020, on Furys Ferry Road and causing a head-on collision that killed Jody Kenny, a nurse for over 30 years at the Medical College of Georgia.
An officer at the scene testified Stanley had a container used for transporting methadone in his vehicle and showed signs of impairment, which was later verified by a blood test, according to court records.
All three Columbia County Superior Court judges recused themselves from the case, citing friendship with the victim’s mother, a longtime employee of the court system administrator’s office.
Stanley has a local criminal record dating to the 1990s. During a 2004 theft by deception charge, he admitted convincing a car dealer the 2003 Hummer he was trading for a 2001 Corvette was paid for. In 2021, after his indictment for vehicular homicide, Stanley was ticketed for a window tint violation.
Visiting Senior Judge Kathy S. Palmer sentenced Stanley on March 20 to 15 years, with the first nine in confinement and the rest on probation.
