Former Tampa Bay Storm arena football player Darion Conner was found guilty yesterday in a Tampa court of DUI manslaughter and vehicular homicide. Conner’s SUV collided with bicyclist Jonathan Conklin in September 2004. Conklin died of his injuries.

Hillsborough County prosecutors accused Conner of striking and killing Conklin with his Toyota Land Cruiser in the early morning hours of Sept. 4, 2004. A subsequent blood alcohol test showed Conner’s blood alcohol level to be 0.273 – over three times the legal limit of 0.08.

Witnesses testified that Conner repeatedly swerved into the left lane of Linebaugh Avenue and then jerked the wheel back to the right, overcorrecting into the bike lane. He struck Conklin from behind in the bike lane. Conner told deputies that he swerved to avoid another car.

Conner was convicted of these charges once before and was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2005. The conviction was overturned on appeal in 2008 due to the display of an irrelevant and prejudicial photograph of the victim to the jury.

During this re-trial, Conner’s attorneys attacked the blood tests, saying the sample was taken two hours after the accident and that it was improperly stored. The jury, however, took only an hour and 10 minutes to reach the guilty verdicts.

Conner has three previous DUI convictions.

Conner faces up to 15 years in prison on each count. His sentencing is scheduled for April 30. He played for the Storm from 1999 to 2005, having played for several different NFL teams from 1990 until 1997.

DUI

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 9th, 2009 at 8:43 am and is filed under Florida Criminal Law News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.