SPOKANE — The dump truck driver who barreled through a tax office and a coffee stand last summer, and sent seven people to the hospital, was sentenced to 15 months in prison on Wednesday.
Attorneys on both sides Wednesday called it a miracle that the crash wasn’t worse.
“It is essentially a miracle that no one else was injured more severely, including Mr. Medrain,” said Kyle Zeller, the attorney representing the driver, McGavin Medrain.
Medrain, donning a blue Spokane County Jail jumpsuit, pleaded guilty to vehicular assault Wednesday in Spokane County Superior Court. Judge Rachelle Anderson sentenced Medrain to 15 months in prison, the joint recommendation from Zeller and Spokane County Deputy Prosecutor Joseph Edwards.
Anderson credited Medrain for time served, which was about five and a half months.
The standard sentence range was 15 to 20 months of incarceration. Medrain faced a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $20,000 fine.
Medrain will also serve 18 months of community custody when he is released from prison.
Witnesses said Medrain was traveling north on Freya Street at a “high rate of speed” and weaving in and out of traffic on Aug. 20, according to court documents. Just past Fifth Avenue, the truck struck several vehicles before veering west across the street and driving through Liberty Tax Service and the Dutch Bros. coffee stand, destroying both structures.
Medrain told The Spokesman-Review in a September jail interview that his brakes failed. Zeller told the court Wednesday he believes a further investigation would discover an issue with the brakes.
Medrain declined at the time to name the company for which he had been trucking, and court documents didn’t specify it.
A state trooper conducted a field sobriety test after the crash and determined Medrain was intoxicated on an unknown substance, court documents said. Medrain said in September he used methamphetamine the night before the incident but was sober at the time of the crash. vHe said he has struggled with addiction for at least two decades.
One of the seven people taken to the hospital was a Dutch Bros. employee who sustained a fractured hip, according to court documents.
“I’m so thankful no one got killed in that accident,” Medrain said Wednesday.
Anderson said Medrain will lose his commercial driver’s license, which Medrain said he obtained in 2009.
Zeller said Medrain is remorseful about the crash and that it has given him nightmares.
Meanwhile, Dutch Bros. and Liberty Tax Service will rebuild at the same location.
Mark Mahaffey, co-owner of the Liberty Tax Service branches in Spokane, said last month he hopes to open the tax preparation office in November or December. Kevin Parker, who owns the Dutch Bros. franchise in Spokane, said in a text message Saturday that he hopes to open by April 1.
“I am deeply grateful no lives were lost as a result of the accident, including my daughter who was working in the stand when the accident took place,” Parker wrote in a text Wednesday. “The accident happened on a Friday, and although I was angry over the weekend, when I woke up Monday morning, I experienced a deep sense of gratitude I was not planning my daughter’s funeral or attending a funeral for one of my employees.”
