Burning Atlanta

This piece of puke could have killed somebody. Innocent people are paying for the rest of their lives for the acts of this criminal asshole and the incompetence of a judicial system that didn't identify him as an illegal and have him deported.

This is exactly the type of thing that happens all over this nation, everyday, and it's inexcusable. Our government doesn't give a damn how many Americans needlessly suffer and die. Too much of an problem to secure the border and ID illegal in our jails.

No excuses. Jail them and deport them.

Mario Roberto Diaz-Mourillo racked up a four-year prison term for driving the wrong way on a Great Smoky Mountains National Park roadway known as the Spur and crashing head-on into a car full of Florida tourists, leaving two of them with permanent injuries.

But Diaz-Mourillo's case was as much about illegal immigration, lax enforcement and willful blindness to it as it was about the May 30 crash.

Born into poverty, denied a decent education and forced to help fend for his family in what was then a hurricane-ravaged country, Diaz-Mourillo broke the law a decade ago by sneaking into the United States "in search of a better life and better jobs," Moffatt wrote. Cry me a damned river. This country cannot absorb the poor of the world. This country cannot, and should not, show any forgiveness to a law-breaking gate-crasher because they have a sob story.

His first brush with East Tennessee law enforcement came in February 2004 when he was convicted in Washington County of charges including driving under the influence, assaulting a police officer and weapons possession.

His second conviction for DUI came in Knox County just 10 days before the head-on crash on the national park roadway. Diaz-Mourillo fled after the crash, so authorities could not prove whether he had been drinking. National Park Service Agent Jeff Carlisle was credited by Schmutzer with tracking down Diaz-Mourillo despite his use of false identification.

Moffatt, who said his client insists he was sober at the time of the crash, urged Senior U.S. District Judge Leon Jordan at Tuesday's hearing to give Diaz-Mourillo the lowest sentence possible. He cited a pending deportation that will separate him from his wife and two children, all three of whom are legal citizens. Boo-Hoo.