Appearing before Suffolk Supreme Court Justice Richard Ambro in Riverside on Thursday morning, Daniel Campbell, the driver in a 2021 hit-and-run in Amagansett, was formally sentenced to 90 days in jail, 90 days of community service, and five years’ probation.
Mr. Campbell was remanded to the Riverhead Correctional Facility at the conclusion of Thursday’s sentencing hearing.
The defendant pleaded guilty in August in the Aug. 10, 2021, hit-and-run accident on Old Stone Highway that led to the death of Devesh Samtani, an 18-year-old pedestrian.
Mr. Samtani was poised to join his older brother at New York University that fall.
Dozens of his family members and friends from Hong Kong were in court Thursday, along with Mr. Campbell’s parents.
Mr. Samtani’s father, Kishore Samtani, his mother, Mala, and his cousin Kabir Kurani all had the opportunity address Mr. Campbell in advance of Justice Ambro handing down his sentence.
Mr. Kurani told Mr. Campbell that his entire family had been devastated and had “collapsed” following the 2021 accident, which occurred after police broke up a house party on Timber Lane that Devesh Samtani had attended with his cousin.
Mr. Campbell was driving his father’s 2012 Honda pilot with his sister and several of her friends in the car when it hit Mr. Samtani. He said he panicked and left the scene.
Mr. Kurani recalled watching Mr. Campbell drive away as his cousin lay on the ground with a fractured skull.
“You left him out there on the ground to suffer and die,” he said. “At what point can we define you as pure evil? You have broken our family.”
Mala Samtani was next at the podium and recollected hearing the news that her son had been gravely wounded.
Mr. Campbell, she said, had “killed my son and my whole family.”
Mr. Campbell may have gotten 90 days for leaving the scene of an accident involving a fatality — but her family would be dealing with a “lifetime of pain.”
“He came here to study,” said Mrs. Samtani, “not for you to take his life away.”
Her husband then stepped to the podium and, in a soft voice, thanked Justice Ambro for reversing a promise he made to Mr. Campbell, in August, that the young man would not face any jail time. Justice Ambro revised his earlier sentencing decision only after information about Mr. Campbell’s recent driving record came to light.
The U.K. Daily Mail reported in late September that Mr. Campbell “has racked up a catalogue of reckless driving violations” that included causing a head-on crash in White Plains in 2021 after going the wrong way down a one-way street, and getting caught speeding just weeks before the Amagansett accident.
In addressing the court, Mr. Samtani highlighted a contentious aspect of this case: the speed at which Mr. Campbell was driving when he struck Devesh. Mr. Samtani was unsatisfied that Mr. Campbell had never admitted he was speeding when he struck Devesh.
Through his attorneys, Mr. Campbell has asserted he was not speeding — an assertion apparently borne out by a Suffolk County grand jury and the Suffolk County district attorney’s office, which, after interviewing numerous witnesses, did not charge Mr. Campbell with any reckless-driving-related charge.
Mr. Campbell was ultimately charged with and convicted on a single criminal count — leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death, a class D felony in New York State punishable by up to seven years in prison. Prosecutors had sought at least a year of jail time for Mr. Campbell.
Edward Burke, Mr. Campbell’s attorney in this case, described his client to the court as a quiet and shy young man who was not the “monster” he was made out to be, and who had a history of poor coping skills and other psychological conditions associated with post-concussion syndrome. Mr. Campbell had suffered numerous concussions through his involvement in high school sports, he told reporters after the hearing.
Mr. Burke offered that he did not raise these issues to “make excuses” for Mr. Campbell, who had already admitted his guilt and responsibility in the fatal accident. He did reiterate, however, that given that there were no drugs or alcohol in play, nor any charges filed of reckless driving or speeding, that his client had simply panicked and left the scene of the accident — and badly regretted doing so.
Moving forward, Mr. Burke said his client “would like to speak to young people about how one bad decision can totally change your life.”
Now it was Mr. Campbell’s turn. He slowly unfolded a white piece of paper and thanked the judge for the opportunity to address the grieving family.
“I am truly sorry for ruining your lives,” he told the courtroom full of Samtani friends and family. He expressed profound regret for leaving the scene of the accident and said he’d “played the night out thousands of times” in his head over the past year. He was anguished, he said, by not being able to express his remorse to the family until today’s hearing.
“I would give anything to change the outcome of that night,” Mr. Campbell said, as he evoked his victim and began to cry.
“I prayed and mourned,” he said, reflecting on the family’s loving and positive descriptions of Devesh and “how good of a person he was. The loss of your son’s life will be with me forever.”
Justice Ambro then addressed the court and explained his change of heart insofar as he was now sending Mr. Campbell to jail after promising him he wouldn’t.
Describing the incident as “a very tragic car accident,” Justice Ambro noted that Mr. Campbell had not committed nor been charged with any crime prior to or associated with the accident.
“There was no allegation of speeding and no criminality with regard to how he was driving,” said Justice Ambro. He also noted that even as he fled the scene, Mr. Campbell’s departure didn’t play a role in whether Devesh received prompt medical attention. That was also a factor in his now-revoked promise to Mr. Campbell, he said.
Justice Ambro said he did not know of Mr. Campbell’s prior driving record until after the hearing in August where he had made that promise.
That information came to him later, via a letter from the Suffolk County district attorney’s office on Sept. 8 and another from a Samtani family lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, on Sept. 18.
“I believe the sentence is fair and reasonable under the facts and circumstances of this case,” Justice Ambro concluded before announcing Mr. Campbell’s punishment, which, along with the jail time, community service, and probation, includes a revocation of his driver’s license and a $2,138 fine.
Justice Ambro, along with Mr. Campbell’s parents and attorneys, quickly departed the courtroom after the sentence was announced.
Silence descended as court officers asked the gathering of Samtani friends and family to wait a few moments before they, too, exited.
For a few minutes, the only sound in the courtroom was of teary sniffles and of handcuffs clicking into place as Mr. Campbell was escorted from the courtroom.