Man who drove drunk into Gallup parade injuring 15 will not face any more jail time

FARMINGTON, N.M. (KRQE) – The man who drove his SUV while drunk through a crowded parade in Gallup in August of 2022, injuring more than a dozen people, will not spend another day in jail.

Jeff Irving pled no-contest to two counts of great bodily harm and two counts of aggravated DWI in February and faced up to six and a half years behind bars. Judge Douglas Decker sentenced Irving to those six and a half years but then suspended the whole sentence in lieu of five years probation and rehabilitation in a men’s recovery program.

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What should have been a day of celebration at the Intertribal Ceremonial Centennial Parade in Gallup that summer turned into chaos after 35-year-old Irving plowed his gold SUV into the crowd, injuring more than a dozen people including two police officers.

Just before Irving took off down the parade route, a police officer approached him in his car where he had been spotted drinking. Lapel video shows how Irving gunned his car right into a crowd of hundreds. A group of bystanders, including a truck driver who actually jumped into Irving’s SUV to stop him, managed to stop and surround the car.

Irving was extremely drunk—three times over the legal limit—and can be heard in lapel video slurring in the back of the police car.

Now, nearly two years later, Irving faced a judge for sentencing. Two witnesses gave statements to the court detailing how that day affected them: “Your tire was coming directly at me, my midline right here, and my daughter pulled me over! I fell over this way, other than that, I probably would have multiple injuries.”

The defense asked for his sentence to be suspended in favor of five years of probation and rehab in a men’s recovery program. They cited Irving’s difficult upbringing. The judge, Douglas Decker, agreed. “I’m going to suspend all that time, giving credit for time served as time served for the amount of time he’s been in jail already,” Decker said.

His case originally had 21 counts against him, but he pled down to these four. Irving was in jail since the crash for a total of 612 days.

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