David Fincher 

A Deschutes County Circuit Court judge on Tuesday denied a request for a shorter prison sentence for a man who killed a 2-year-old girl and injured five others in a 2016 drunken-driving crash.

David William Fincher, 47, had asked Judge A. Michael Adler to shorten his 22-year prison sentence to 10 years.

In February, a 12-person jury found Fincher, a former paramedic with no prior criminal record, guilty of 15 charges, including first-degree manslaughter, third-degree assault, reckless endangerment and driving under the influence of intoxicants. At Fincher’s sentencing the next month, Adler made Fincher’s 10-year manslaughter sentence consecutive to the 12 years he earned for the other charges.

The manslaughter charge related to the death of Marley Elizabeth Peterson, who on the morning of Sept. 11, 2016, was traveling with her mother and brother to the Sisters Folk Festival.

It took the jury just over an hour to find that Fincher had acted with “extreme indifference” in causing Marley’s death and the injuries to the five others.

Fincher could have received 17 years if he’d taken a plea deal offered by the Deschutes County District Attorney’s Office. But instead, he opted for a jury trial. The 22-year sentence Adler gave Fincher was nearly the maximum allowable sentence for the counts he was charged with.

In July, Fincher’s attorney, Todd Grover, submitted a request to modify the 22-year sentence to 10 years. Grover argued the physical injuries suffered by the five injured people was not a compelling reason to impose the maximum prison sentences.

“It is no disrespect to the victims of the charged assaults in this case to note that the physical … injuries that they suffered were not substantially greater than those suffered by most other victims of motor-vehicle related assaults,” Grover said.

Fincher appeared in court Tuesday by video link from the Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem.

In the end, Adler sided with Deputy District Attorney Kandy Gies, who also worked the original case.

She argued in a short motion opposing Fincher’s motion there had been no clerical or legal error in Adler’s decision.

“The victims and victims’ families were present in open court when the judgment was imposed based (on) the jury findings, the facts, and the evidence presented at the time,” Gies wrote. “To later request the court to re-evaluate the sentence previously imposed re-victimizes the victims and victims’ families.”

Fincher’s motion was accompanied by a letter from his sister, Dina Fincher-Hacker, who said her brother’s sentence was harsh considering he didn’t intentionally set out to kill Marley. She said defendants guilty of intentional acts of violence regularly received far lighter sentences.

“David is a good person,” wrote Fincher-Hacker. “He screwed up, but at core is a wonderful human being. David had a clean record; he did not wake up and decide to cause harm that day, there was no planning, no calculating, no malice, no history of this type of behavior. David is not a monster or an evil person.”

In April, Fincher initiated an appeal of his conviction.

— Reporter: 541-383-0325, gandrews@bendbulletin.com