A man who fled to Ireland to avoid charges that he killed three American college students in a 2001 drink-driving crash has been jailed in the United States.
Frederick Russell (29) was sentenced to the maximum 14 years and three months in prison by a judge who told him he deserved no leniency.
Frederick Russell enters Whitman County courtroom in Washington State yesterday
He was convicted in November on three counts of vehicular homicide and three counts of vehicular assault.
Russell was drunk, speeding and trying to overtake in a no-overtaking zone when his car crossed the centre line and smashed into a car containing six fellow Washington State University students.
"I'm sorry - you've been waiting too long to hear that," Russell told the surviving victims and the relatives of those killed.
Russell, who suffered only minor injuries in the crash, failed to appear for a court hearing after the crash and fled to Ireland.
Russell, who was on a US police most-wanted list, was working as a security guard in a Dublin city centre store when in 2005, a colleague surfing the internet spotted his posting on the wanted website.
He was using an alias, David Carroll, and had been living in Celbridge, Co Kildare, with his girlfriend.
Russell fought extradition but was returned to the United States in 2006, and the judge declined to give him credit for time he served while awaiting extradition from Ireland.
AP