NORTHAMPTON — A South Hadley teenager was sentenced Tuesday to a year in jail in the death of a Westfield man delivering pizza in the spring of 2016.

Ryan D. Brunelle, 19, pleaded guilty in Hampshire Superior Court to negligent motor vehicle homicide while under the influence of drugs.

Brunelle was driving on May 22, 2016, when his car crossed the center line on College Street in South Hadley and struck the vehicle of 29-year-old Thomas Flanagan, of Westfield. The father of two young children, Flanagan was working as a delivery driver to earn extra income for his family. He was taken to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, where he was pronounced dead.

Flanagan’s and Brunelle’s families packed the courtroom Tuesday afternoon for the hearing. Waiting for Judge Richard Carey to take the bench, the courtroom was nearly silent despite the crowd of people seated in the room.

“There is no disposition, there is no sentence as both counsel has indicated that is satisfactory,” Carey said. “The court is often left simply to convey, in this case to Angela and Liam and Gianna (Flanagan’s family) how sorry I am, how profoundly sorry I am that this happened.”

In addition to one year in jail, Carey sentenced Brunelle to three years of probation with conditions that include six months of house arrest and 15 years without a driver’s license. If Brunelle does not comply with the terms of his probation he could serve an additional 18-month sentence. The sentence was presented as an agreed plea by both the prosecutor and defense attorney. Carey described the disposition as fair and merciful.

“It reflects what I believe from what I’ve read, what Thomas Flanagan would want,” Carey said. “That it is compassionate, that it is thoughtful and in some ways, his last act in agreeing to this disposition through all of you, his family members, is an act of kindness and that is one more wonderful reflection of Thomas Flanagan.”

In court Tuesday, Brunelle, seated next to his attorney David Hoose, listened as First Assistant Northwestern District Attorney Steven Gagne outlined the details in the case. He kept his eyes forward as Gagne read aloud statements submitted by Flanagan’s wife, Angela, and his mother, Kelly LaBombard.

“On May 22, 2016, my life as I knew it changed forever,” Angela Flanagan wrote.

After receiving a phone call from her aunt that Tom had been in accident, Flanagan said she knew something horrible had happened.

Arriving first at the wrong hospital, Flanagan wrote that for a second she thought Tom might be OK.

“The physical pain I hope will subside but the emotional pain from this criminal act will always be with me,” Flanagan wrote.

Along with taking the life of “an amazing man,” Flanagan said, Brunelle also took a piece of life from her, her children, Tom’s mother and family.

“Our lives as we knew were also taken on May 22, 2016,” she wrote. “My one hope is that no other family will have to go through the pain we have gone through at the hands of Ryan Brunelle.”

In her statement, LaBombard wrote that he “was the best son any mother could ever wish for.” Her first-born son, Flanagan left behind eight siblings.

LaBombard wrote that Flanagan’s son is now afraid to go to school, afraid his mother is going to die in a car accident, too.

“Ryan Brunelle has robbed our family of our future with Tom,” LaBombard wrote. “He chose to take drugs and get in his car and drive that Sunday evening. Tom had no way of knowing this and he died because of it.”

LaBombard, in her statement, asked for the maximum 2½-year sentence for Brunelle “in hopes of feeling remorse for the life he has taken.”

A total of seven impact statements were written by Flanagan’s family and submitted to the judge before the hearing. Following the statements, Gagne gave the judge a photo of the young family as well as a document from Flanagan’s young son and a drawing from his daughter.

Addressing the judge, Hoose said there was “no good explanation for the death of Thomas Flanagan.”

“Ryan Brunelle didn’t go out that evening with the intent to kill someone,” Hoose said. “This is not even the case where he was out partying all day.”

Police seized a blood sample collected at the hospital from Brunelle shortly after the crash. An analysis of the blood found the presence of alprazolam, commonly known as Xanax. Brunelle did not have a prescription for the medication.

“This is a young man who was a very ordinary teenager up until his junior year of high school when he just lapsed into a profound depression,” Hoose said. “His parents were obviously  tremendously concerned about him … they took him to therapists, tried medications. Nobody could come up with the answer as to what was wrong.”

Hoose told the judge that with the availability of prescription medications that can be found “on the street,” Brunelle found a drug that made him feel better.

The night before the crash was Brunelle’s junior prom and he had taken “a substantial amount” of Xanax to get him through the night, Hoose said.

After a nap that Sunday, Brunelle was on his way to meet his dad for dinner when the crash occurred.

“He really didn’t think and had a hard time at the beginning thinking what he had taken the night before could have affected him to that level,” Hoose said. “Ryan has to live ... the rest of his life knowing that he took the life of another human being.”

Emily Cutts can be reached at ecutts@gazettenet.com.]]>