SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — A South Bay jury has convicted a party bus owner of involuntary manslaughter in the death of a 25-year-old woman who fell out of a faulty bus door that the owner knew about but ignored.
The San Jose Mercury News reports 58-year-old Jon Reno St. James was convicted Wednesday in the Superior Court of Santa Clara County. He faces up to four years in jail and is set to be sentenced May 29.
Natasha Noland was on one of St. James' buses in 2012 heading back to Santa Cruz on Highway 17 with a dozen other passengers after a concert in Mountain View.
According to witnesses and the California Highway Patrol, Noland and another woman were drunkenly fighting in the bus when they both tumbled out the door. Noland fell underneath the vehicle and died from her injuries. The other woman sustained a head injury but survived.
