Driver in fatal Boy Scouts crash in plea agreement talks, judge says

The Holbrook man accused of killing a 12-year-old boy last fall when he drove drunk into a group of Boy Scouts in Manorville is negotiating a plea agreement with the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office, a judge said Monday.

Thomas Murphy, 60, faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted of aggravated vehicular homicide and other charges.

Suffolk prosecutors say Murphy’s blood-alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit Sept. 30 when he plowed into Andrew McMorris and other members of Troop 161 as they walked along David Terry Road.  Andrew, of Wading River, died Oct. 1. Four others suffered injuries.

News of the possible plea deal provided little comfort to the family of Andrew, a seventh-grader at Albert Prodell Middle School in Shoreham at the time of his death.

“I was given a life sentence without my son,” said the boy's mother, Alisa McMorris. “My son was given a life sentence.”

Murphy is trying to negotiate a plea with prosecutors, said State Supreme Court Judge Fernando Camacho Monday during a hearing in First District Court in Central Islip.

Camacho ordered Murphy to return to his courtroom March 25. A 16-count indictment filed in October against Murphy includes a top charge of aggravated vehicular homicide, which carries a maximum penalty of 8 1/3 to 25 years in prison. Other counts include lesser homicide and assault charges, driving while intoxicated, reckless driving and reckless endangerment.

Murphy is charged with aggravated vehicular homicide under two different legal theories — killing a person while seriously injuring others and doing it while driving with a blood-alcohol content of more than 0.18 percent

Attorney Stephen McCarthy Jr., of Manhattan, read a statement after the hearing on behalf of Murphy, expressing his client's remorse and acceptance of responsibility for the fatal crash. 

“This is a tragedy that I can never make right,” McCarthy said, quoting Murphy, who stood silently nearby.

Members of Andrew’s Boy Scout troop and other McMorris family supporters crowded into Camacho’s courtroom Monday for the hearing.

“He is very sorely missed, said Aaron McClintock, 14, of Troop 161. “Everyone is destroyed by it. Everyone is very distraught.”

Prosecutors say the defendant was drinking vodka during a day of golf with friends but declined a ride before climbing into his 2016 Mercedes-Benz and crashing into the Boy Scouts walking along the tree-lined road. Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini’s office declined to comment after the hearing.

“On Sept. 30, I lost a piece of my heart,” Alisa McMorris told reporters after Monday’s hearing. “My husband, my daughter, we all lost something so great.”