Attorney Antonio Tolliver accepts fault in fatal DUI crash

ATLANTA -- An Atlanta attoey has accepted the blame for a DUI crash that killed a passenger and critically injured two others.

Channel 2’s Richard Elliot went to the Fulton County Courthouse in downtown Atlanta where the defendant, Antonio Tolliver, came face to face with survivors and victim’s family members. All of them testified about the crash's effect on their lives and then listened to what Tolliver had to say.

”I was drinking and driving. I had no business behind the wheel, he said.

Tolliver was an Atlanta attoey in 2006 when, according to police, he slammed into a taxi cab on his way home from a football game. The crash killed passenger Shannon Brown, blinded her boyfriend, Elbert Hall, and left driver John McLendon brain damaged.

Judge Constance Russell declined Tolliver’s request to speak directly to the victims' families after they signaled they did not want to hear it, but Tolliver expressed regret.

"I would like to offer my humble apology and regret for causing this serious accident," he said.

Tolliver had four previous DUI charges, and his family testified he had long struggled with bipolar disorder and alcoholism. Investigators said Tolliver's blood alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit during the crash.

Brown's mother asked the judge for the maximum sentence.

”I'm asking, I'm pleading with you, whatever is in your means, whatever is in the bounds of the state of Georgia, I'm asking you to hit him with the max. Let him know what he's done is wrong, Brown’s mother, Carolyn Hairston, said.

The judge did not give Tolliver the maximum sentence, but 25 years in prison instead.