Man who drank at go-go bar sentenced to prison for drunk-driving death

Robert Pennington will have to serve more than five years in prison before becoming eligible for parole. Watch video

FREEHOLD -- A Superior Court judge on Friday sentenced a Marlboro man who spent eight hours drinking at a go-go bar to six years in prison for killing a software engineer in a drunk driving crash in Holmdel.

The lives of Robert Pennington, 51, and Siva Kovvuri, 32, tragically collided on Dec. 5, 2014, when both men took wrong turns in their respective travels and ended up on Route 34 south in Holmdel, where the head-on crash occurred shortly before midnight.

"Every human life is precious and none should have their light dimmed prematurely," Judge Anthony Mellaci Jr. said before imposing sentence. "You dimmed a bright light."

Pennington, an environmental engineer for an Edison firm, said he remembers having 10 beers at Fantasies go-go bar in Keyport between 2 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. before getting in his car to head home.

And on the same night, Kovvuri and his wife were attending a family gathering at his sister's house in the Morganville section of Marlboro when Kovvuri agreed to run to a local store for soda.

Not familiar with the area, Kovvuri, from the Parlin section of Old Bridge, took a wrong turn and ended up on Route 34 north, Assistant Monmouth County Prosecutor Tara Wilson said. Around the same time, Pennington passed his home and ended up on Route 34 south in Holmdel, where he crossed the double-yellow line and crashed head-on into Kovvuri's 2008 Hyundai Accent near East Lawn Drive. Pennington had a blood-alcohol level of 0.258, more than three times the legal limit to drive in New Jersey.

Mellaci lectured Pennington about getting behind the wheel of his car while knowing how much alcohol he consumed.

"If you're going to sit in a bar for the time period that you sat in the bar, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that you shouldn't get behind the wheel."

The judge said he understands that families of the victims of drunk driving crashes don't feel they get justice with any sentence.

"If it was my wife or my family member that was killed this way, I'd only ask for you to spend about a half hour in my presence with no one else around or spend the next 30 years in jail (but) that wouldn't bring my loved one back."

Pennington, who admitted to continuing to drinking alcohol after pleading guilty to vehicular manslaughter in January, told court officials he doesn't have a drinking problem and can stop whenever he wants.

"And you don't think you have a drinking problem?" Mellaci asked him incredulously.

"I've never been diagnosed with it," he said.

Mellaci noted that this was Pennington's first drunk driving offense but said that doesn't necessarily mean this was the first time he drove drunk.

"It's very unusual for someone to get picked up for drunk driving their first time, so yes, sir, you have an alcohol problem," Mellaci said. "And the fact that you would say ... that you're not dependent on it and can stop at any time shows me you have very little insight into what happened here."

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A volunteer at St. Jude's Children's Hospital, Kovvuri was active with the Children's Make-a-Wish Foundation and helped build homes after Hurricane Sandy, his wife Mrudulla Mollidi and sister Satya Sabbella said in letters to Mellaci.

Mollidi moved to the United States from India to wed Kovvuri in 2011 through an arranged marriage, but she returned to her homeland after her husband's death because she couldn't bear to be without him in their home, Wilson said.

"He treated me like a princess from the very first day," she said in her letter, read by Wilson.

His sister, who cried throughout the proceeding, called Kovvuri "a perfect son, a loving husband, an affectionate brother, a dependable coworker, a very reliable and trustworthy friend."

He obtained his undergraduate degree in India and earned the vice-president's fellowship at Utah State University where he earned his master's degree in computer science before moving to New Jersey, she said.

In her letter read by Assistant Monmouth County Prosecutor Nicole Wallace, Sabbella said she is wracked with guilt at asking her brother to get the soda that night. 

Dressed in a dark suit and a striped tie, Pennington hung his head for most of the proceeding while his two daughters, sitting in the audience, cried.

"I know it was wrong. I understand it has hurt people very badly, and I am very sorry," he said, his voice breaking.

Clark asked Mellaci to sentence Pennington to five years in prison -- two years fewer than called for in the plea agreement. Pennington will have to serve slightly more than five years in prison before becoming eligible for parole.