- A doctor accused of intentionally pushing a family off a cliff in his Tesla car could avoid trial.
- The judge granted Dharmesh Patel’s request for mental health diversion.
- The district attorney’s office, which filed attempted murder charges against Patel, told BI it was “disappointed.”
A California doctor accused of intentionally driving a Tesla car off a cliff with his family inside has been given a chance to have the charges dropped.
A San Mateo County judge on June 20 granted Dharmesh Patel’s request to enter a mental health diversion program, allowing him to avoid trial on an attempted murder charge.
San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaff, who prosecuted Patel, slammed Judge Susan Jakubowski’s order, telling Business Insider on Wednesday that he was “disappointed with the court’s decision.”
“Judge Jakubowski carefully considered the evidence and the facts and ruled against him,” Wagstaff said. “If I were the judge, I certainly would have ruled against him, but that’s the way our criminal justice system works. We can’t win every case.”
Participation in diversion programs for minors, veterans and defendants battling mental illness or substance abuse has become an increasingly popular alternative to prison time across the United States.
If a defendant charged with a crime is admitted to one of these specialized programs (which vary by state), they are typically required to receive therapy and medical services tailored to their needs. If a defendant successfully completes the program, they can often avoid a harsher sentence or trial, or in some cases, avoid a guilty plea altogether.
Patel was charged last year with three counts of attempted murder for allegedly killing his wife and two young children by pushing them off a notorious 250-foot cliff in Northern California on Jan. 2, 2023. He has since pleaded not guilty.
The family miraculously survived the fall from a cliff known as the “Devil’s Slide.”
Wagstaff previously told BI that Ms Patel’s wife shouted to rescue workers at the scene that her husband, a radiologist, “was trying to kill us” and that he “deliberately drove the car off the cliff”.
Still, the wife said she did not want her husband to be charged and had previously asked the court to release him from prison.
At a hearing last Thursday, Judge Jakubowski found Patel eligible for the state’s mental health diversion program and “concluded that the appropriate diagnosis of the defendant’s mental illness is severe depression, which is a mental illness as defined by law,” according to the district attorney’s office.
Patel has been held in the county jail since last year and is expected to remain there for a few weeks as a “bridge period” before he is officially released, the district attorney’s office said in a statement.
According to the district attorney’s office, the judge ordered Patel to appear in court once a week for progress reports, to be monitored by GPS, to live at her parents’ home in San Mateo County and to only leave her home to go to court or mental health treatment sessions for the first two months.
Under the court order, Patel must also submit to twice-weekly testing to prove he is complying with his medication, not consuming alcohol or drugs or possessing weapons, and surrender his driving licence and passport.
Wagstaff told BI the charges against Patel have now been stayed and will be automatically dropped if he successfully completes a two-year diversion programme.
“If during the two-year period he violates any of the diversion requirements imposed by Judge Jakubowski, the diversion could be revoked and the attempted murder charge could continue,” Wagstaff said.
Patel’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Meanwhile, Wagstaff told BI that while he was upset with the judge’s ruling, he was also “angry” with the California Legislature and Governor Gavin Newsom, who “don’t believe that including violent crimes like attempted murder in the Mental Health Diversion Act poses a public safety risk.”
Under California law, defendants charged with other crimes, such as murder, manslaughter or rape, are not eligible for diversion programs.
“I strongly disagree with their conclusions,” the district attorney said.
The governor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
