Randolph Ang, 23, who ran a red light while rushing to get to work on his bicycle at Mission Street and The Embarcadero on July 15, 2011, in San Francisco, CA, subsequently struck Dionette Cherney, 68, of Washington DC, who later died from her head injuries.
As a result, Ang accepted a plea agreement that will include only probation and community service, thanks largely to Cherney's husband, Colburn, who told the San Francisco Examiner, “Our loss is done. This city has a real problem. Unless people start obeying the law or it gets enforced, more people are going to have to go through this,” Cherney yesterday (March 12) in court.
COMMENT: Cherney explained in court why he didn't want Ang to face the maximum sentence of one year in county jail. "It would not do anything to bring (my) wife back," he said.
Cherney's daughter, Beth Harvey, also spoke during Monday's sentencing. She showed pictures of her fallen mother to Ang to try to express the magnitude of her family's loss, commenting to Ang that rather than making a trip to Paris with her mother, she now faces the task of burying her ashes.
On a global level, and with a proliferation of commuters who bike to work in addition to using bicycles for fitness and recreation, cities must reckon with the ambivalence that most communities have for cyclists who daily disobey rules of the road and hurt and kill people in the process. Fortunately, Ang was forced to face the angst of the Cherney family.
