Earl Moore EMTs to face murder charges judge rejects claim

Source: Elena Popova / Getty

We love a judge who stands on business.

Earlier this year, BOSSIP reported on the alleged murder of a 35-year-old Black man Earl Moore who died after EMTs in Springfield, Illinois, Peter Cadigan and Peggy Finley, strapped him face-down onto a gurney on the night of Dec. 18, 2022. Moore was suffocated to death and Sangamon County Coroner Jim Allmon ruled his death a homicide saying it was caused by, “compressional and positional asphyxia due to prone face-down restraint on a paramedic transportation cot/stretcher by tightened straps across the back.”

As you can imagine, the ambulance company that employs Cadigan and Finley is trying its damnedest to weasel their way out of accountability. However, according to News One, Sangamon County Judge John Madonia isn’t here for the shenanigans. In response to the company’s legal team arguing that first-degree murder charges were “inappropriate” for the situation, Judge Madonia lucidly ruled otherwise.

“Knowledge through training at the most basic levels would suggest that these particular actors or defendants, in this case, had the requisite knowledge to know that what they were doing could cause substantial great bodily harm or potential loss of life,” Madonia ruled about LifeStar Ambulance Service reports News Channel 20. 

Bang the muthaf***in’ gavel. The audacity of this intentionally obtuse outfit to argue as if trained and certified EMTs don’t know that it’s not a great idea to STRAP SOMEONE FACE DOWN onto essentially a rolling mattress. States Attorney Dan Wright added a plus-one to Judge Madonia’s thoughts:

“Knowing based upon their training, experience, and the surrounding circumstances that such acts would create bodily harm and/or death, in violation of the Criminal Code of the state of Illinois, potential penalties faced by both defendants include a range of 20 to 60 years in the Department of Corrections,”

We’re no lawyers but it sounds open-and-shut to us. Put these thugs where they belong.