Senator's son gets 28 years for killing sheriff's deputy in car chase

The son of Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) has been sentenced to 28 years in prison for a car chase that killed a sheriff's deputy, The Associated Press reported on Monday.

This comes after Ian Cramer, 43, pleaded guilty three months ago to a bevy of offenses "including homicide while fleeing a peace officer, preventing arrest, reckless endangerment, fleeing an officer and drug- and driving-related offenses. Those charges related to a Dec. 6, 2023, chase and crash that killed Mercer County Sheriff’s Deputy Paul Martin, 53."

The sentence also includes 10 years suspended and three years probation, along with a recommendation for substance abuse treatment.

He is unlikely to serve the entirety of that sentence, according to the sentencing judge, Bobbi Weiler.

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“The Department of Corrections has their own policy on how much time you’re going to serve,” said Weiler. “These are not mandatory minimums, which means that you’re probably going to serve a small portion of that 28 years and be out on parole, so that’ll ... give you an opportunity to have a second chance that Deputy Martin does not have, nor does his family have.”

In the incident, Cramer was reportedly high on methamphetamine and bath salts when he stole his mother's SUV, fled a hospital, and drove 70 miles, at times topping 100 miles per hour as he tried to evade law enforcement.

Martin was standing beside his patrol vehicle and attempting to deploy a tire-deflation device on the road, when Cramer veered the SUV, striking the patrol vehicle and causing it to slam into Martin, who died at a hospital.

Cramer initially pleaded not guilty after being charged last December, but changed his plea to guilty in September.

The senator, who has represented North Dakota in the upper chamber since 2019, has said his son "suffers from serious mental disorders which manifest in severe paranoia and hallucinations."