The Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office testified at the Ohio Supreme Court Wednesday and asked the justices to overturn a ruling by the Eighth District Court of Appeals that overturned the murder conviction of Leander Bissell.
Bissell is the driver who hit and killed Cleveland Firefighter Johnny Tetrick, who was clearing the scene of an accident on I-90 in November 2022.
The appeals court ruled the state failed to prove that Bissell acted knowingly when he hit Tetrick and instead found him guilty of involuntary manslaughter.
Investigators said while traffic was being diverted around the scene into the two right lanes, Bissell drove his vehicle around the left side of a police cruiser and onto the shoulder of the highway, veered into the second left lane, accelerated, hitting Tetrick, then fled the scene.
On Wednesday, the state supreme court justices asked Bissell's attorney, "At a scene with seven police cars and a fire truck, what would the probablity be that those first responders would be walking around the scene?"
"It can't just be that they're walking. It's got to be that you're gonna hit somebody. And I think you can assume that if you're going to say that you should know there's police officers here and firemen here, that you also assume that they're going to be careful... they're going to look before they cross." Bissell's attorney said. "That's why this is recklessness. This is why this is recklessness."
Bissell was originally sentenced to 16 years to life on the murder conviction. The change to involuntary manslaughter comes with a sentence of up to 11 years.
