Prosecutors have asked for an 11-year sentence for Lee Harold Cromwell, 67, of Oak Ridge, for his one vehicular homicide conviction and eight aggravated assault convictions in a fatal parking lot crash at the Midtown Community Center in Oak Ridge after fireworks on July 4, 2015. His defense attorney has asked for a three-year suspended sentence. Cromwell is pictured above during a three-day trial from Feb. 13-15, 2017, in Anderson County Criminal Court in Clinton. He has a sentencing hearing scheduled for Monday, June 19. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
Note: This story was updated at 5:20 p.m.
CLINTON—A public defender has asked for a three-year suspended sentence for Lee Cromwell, the Oak Ridge man convicted of one count of vehicular homicide and eight counts of aggravated assault in the fatal parking lot crash at Midtown Community Center after fireworks on July 4, 2015.
The three-year suspended sentence would be much less than what prosecutors have requested, an effective 11-year sentence.
Cromwell, 67, has a sentencing hearing scheduled with Senior Judge Paul Summers in Anderson County Criminal Court in Clinton at 1 p.m. Monday, June 19.
The July 4 fireworks crash killed James Robinson of Knoxville, a 37-year-old husband and father who was trying to push his two daughters to safety. The crash injured eight others. It’s one of the worst crashes anyone can remember in Oak Ridge.
Cromwell was convicted of the vehicular homicide and aggravated assault charges after a three-day trial in Anderson County Criminal Court in Clinton in February. His initial sentencing hearing was postponed because Cromwell did not want private attorney James Scott representing him anymore. Anderson County Public Defender Tom Marshall has been appointed instead. Scott had previously filed a motion to withdraw from the case and then renewed it during an April 11 hearing, citing irreconcilable differences with Cromwell, according to court records.
In April, Deputy District Attorney General Anthony J. Craighead of the Seventh Judicial District in Anderson County asked for the effective 11-year sentence to be served in a state prison. Craighead asked for that sentence in a notice of enhancement factors that was filed in Anderson County Criminal Court. [Read more…]
