Gardineer sentenced for breaking Leandra’s Law

ALBANY COUNTY — Graham Gardineer, 41, of Guilderland, was sentenced on Jan. 8 by Judge Stephen W. Herrick in Albany County Court to one-and-two-thirds to five years in state prison for aggravated driving while intoxicated with a child in the vehicle, a felony; his sentence will run consecutive to one to three years in state prison for violation of probation, according to a release from the Albany County District Attorney’s Office.

Gardineer was also sentenced to three years of mandatory ignition interlock device use and an 18-month minimum license revocation subject to the state Department of Motor Vehicles, and fined $2,000, the release said.

Gardineer was arrested on Oct. 9, 2015, by an Albany County Sheriff’s Office patrolman near Route 157 and Barber Lane in Berne, after a complainant called about a drunk driver, according to the release. After being stopped, Gardineer showed signs of intoxication, failed field sobriety tests, had a blood alcohol content of .09, and was driving without an ignition interlock device, in violation of probation from a previous DWI charge, according to the release.

Gardineer was charged with the felony for violating Leandra's Law, a child passenger protection act in New York that charges an automatic felony on the first offense of driving drunk with a person age 15 or younger inside the vehicle with a blood alcohol content at 0.08. The law is named for Leandra Rosado who was 11 when she was killed in 2009, in New York City, the passenger in a car driven by an allegedly drunk driver that flipped over.

— Jo E. Prout

More Hilltowns News

  • Berne-Knox-Westerlo’s $24.7 million budget, with a 3.3 percent tax increase, passed with 70-percent approval from voters, who also re-elected incumbents Matthew Tedeschi and Rebecca Miller to the board of education. 

  • The Rensselaerville Town Board recently cleared out all the red tape blocking the Kuhar Endowment Fund from being administered to local not-for-profits, but the delays and a lack of adequate publicity resulted in at least one organization not knowing it had to apply again. 

  • The law will make it easier for residents to build accessory-dwelling units that are up to 1,200 square feet of living space, in what is at least partly an effort to keep senior citizens in the town. 

The Altamont Enterprise is focused on hyper-local, high-quality journalism. We produce free election guides, curate readers' opinion pieces, and engage with important local issues. Subscriptions open full access to our work and make it possible.