Boo boon to more charges after crash victim dies
Jailed Palm Bay jig may get more years: Manslaughter charges loom after crash victim dies from 3-year-old wounds
A 23-year-old mud already serving prison time for a traffic crash almost three years ago involving a police chase now faces manslaughter charges after a woman died in September as a result of injuries from the collision.
Bernard "Boo" Johnson, an inmate at the Calhoun Correctional Institution in Blountstown, was charged with manslaughter in November after officials linked the woman's death to injuries suffered in a May 2007 police pursuit. Johnson was the woman's boyfriend, family members said.
The one-time Palm Bay resident will have a Feb. 10 hearing on the new charge.
Prosecutors point out that there is no statute of limitations, nor set time period, for any criminal offense involving death to be brought to trial.
"It's still hard but I feel that they should," pursue the additional charges, said Jeanette Gowins, the mother of
Joceyln A. Gowins, the crash victim.
"There was another couple in the car with them and what they tell me is that my daughter begged for him to stop and to let her out. That just sticks out in my mind because I wasn't able to be there to protect my child."
Johnson was originally charged with DUI with serious bodily injury, reckless driving and aggravated fleeing and eluding along with several traffic violations stemming from the 2007 case. He was to be released from prison in 2020, according to the Florida Department of Corrections.
Melbourne police had initially attempted to pull Johnson in his tan Mercury over for a traffic stop when he led patrol officers on a chase from U.S. 1 to Palm Bay Road and Babcock Street, officials said. Patrol officers at one point used spiked strips to flatten the Mercury's tires, officials reported.
Police reported that Jocelyn Gowins, a nursing student, was thrown from the vehicle after it crashed into a Chevy Suburban and suffered severe head trauma during the incident.
She was rushed to Holmes Regional Medical Center in Melbourne but never recovered from her injuries, officials said.
"She couldn't move or anything," said Jeanette Gowins, who lives in Melbourne. "I would walk into the room and call her name. She would open her eyes but couldn't turn."
Gowins said she had hoped that Johnson, who has Jocelyn's name tattooed on his right arm, would have apologized for his actions in court.
"He didn't open his mouth to say anything," Jeanette Gowins said. "I really looked for him to say he was sorry, but he didn't."
"She was a hard worker, ambitious. I just thought he was living a different life that I didn't want my daughter to be involved in."
Johnson is being held at the Brevard County Detention Center until the hearing.
