Home confinement sentence denies justice for victim of fatal crash, family says

Joseph Kohut, The Times-Tribune, Scranton, Pa.
·2 min read

Jun. 1—Justice is not served by a house arrest sentence imposed this week in Susquehanna County Court on a Union Dale woman who admitted she struck and killed a Vandling teenager, the victim's family said.

"I think it's ridiculous," said Tabatha Clark Rettberg, grandmother of Jeremy Clark, whose death in 2021 led to the arrests of three people. "The family is in an uproar."

President Judge Jason Legg on Wednesday sentenced Brooke Nicole Petersen to nine months of house arrest under electronic monitoring followed by five years of probation. She pleaded guilty May 17 to involuntary manslaughter for causing the death of the 17-year-old Clark on Oct. 23, 2021.

A message left for her attorney, Paul Walker, was not returned.

In addition to Petersen, 21, state police charged her mother, Gloria M. Davis, 48; and her boyfriend, Joseph Daniel Thomas, 24. State police accused the two co-defendants of returning to the scene with Petersen and agreeing not to disclose what had happened.

State police alleged Petersen struck Clark at 3:25 a.m. on state Route 171 in Clifford Twp. and then left the scene.

One of Clark's friends, Dominick Justice, reported he and Clark decided to lay down and rest on a walk home from a party. He woke to a vehicle striking Clark.

"What if you stopped right away and called 911?" pondered Tabby Ann Rettberg, Clark's aunt, in a statement she prepared for court. "Would he still be with us? Could those couple extra minutes have saved his life? Nobody knows. Nobody can know."

Davis and Thomas are both are on parole, having served their sentence of one week in jail. Davis pleaded guilty to obstruction and conspiracy to obstruct, court records show. Thomas pleaded guilty to obstruction and conspiracy to tamper with evidence, according to records.

District Attorney Marion O'Malley agreed the sentences were disappointing. She said she requested the judge send Petersen to jail.

"You can't even begin to imagine how they feel," O'Malley said Clark's family.

In her statement, Tabby Rettberg said she only has memories. They fade a little more each day. If she did not have videos of Clark, she might struggle to remember the sound of his voice.

"Their lives are forever changed that he is no longer in theirs," O'Malley said.

Contact the writer: jkohut@timesshamrock.com, 570-348-9100, x5187; @jkohutTT on Twitter.