Ballard To Be Tried As An Adult

Six years or life in prison, that's what today's hearing in the Patrick Ballard murder case boiled down to. Ballard, who is accused of hitting and killing two cyclists on Labor Day 2007, asked to be tried as a youthful offender.
If he got it, the maximum sentence convicted, would have been six years in a youth detention facility. It took only moments for a judge to deny the request.
Patrick Ballard had very little to say about his failed attempt to be tried as a youthful offender for murder.
Only months after being released from a youth detention center for a similar crime, Ballard is accused of driving drunk and running over Art Clemmons and Bill Imle last year as they biked along Bromley Road in Baldwin County.
In a hearing that lasted about twenty minutes, Judge Charles Partin denied Ballard youthful offender status, citing his previous criminal history. It was the appropriate decision according to District Attorney Judy Newcomb. "It was a very important stage of this prosecution and it was very important to us that Mr. Ballard face consequences this time as an adult."
In 2005, Ballard was tried as a youthful offender on manslaughter and leaving the scene of an accident after crashing into another bicyclist, Larry McDuff.
Ballard's attorney, Jim Byrd says he nor his client were surprised by the judges decision. In a phone interview he told News Five, "It was a required step in the procedure. I wouldn't say Patrick was disappointed. I had prepared him for the possibility. He is just not pleased with the accident or his life right now."
Newcomb says the ruling was a relief for the victim's families. "They certainly were concerned that he would be granted youthful offender then the maximum punishment could be three years."
But in the end, Byrd says this case has no winners. "It's a case that nobody enjoys, that nobody wins anything. Both families are suffering but it's the procedure we have to go through in our system of justice."
Ballard remains in the Baldwin County Jail on three hundred thousand dollars bond. His next court appearance should be sometime this summer.