Former Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist and current member of the Pearl Jam touring party, Josh Klinghoffer, is set to be arraigned tomorrow (September 26) on a misdemeanour charge of vehicular manslaughter without gross negligence.
UPDATE (9/26, 2:39 p.m. ET): Through his lawyer, Klinghoffer pleaded "not guilty" to the charge. While an informed source told Rolling Stone that "no criminal intent is alleged" and a review of the evidence determined "there was no phone involved," a lawyer for the Sanchez family disagrees, saying Klinghoffer "appears to be holding a phone" in video footage of him passing in front of a business "seconds" before the crash.
"If they have exculpatory evidence, it's never been presented to us," the attorney, Grayson Yoder, told Rolling Stone. "All I can see is what I see on the video. If he says he's not on his phone, fine. But it's the middle of the day, he's coming into an intersection and there are no brake lights on his vehicle, none, not until a man is hit in the crosswalk. I'm skeptical of exculpatory evidence, and I can't speak to the DA and their charges, but at the end of the day, in broad daylight, he had many, many opportunities for this not to have happened. There's no other word for it besides negligence. We allege that it's gross negligence."
On March 18, the musician was involved in a car accident resulting in the death of 47-year-old pedestrian Israel Sanchez. With his 2022 black GMC Yukon SUV, Klinghoffer hit Sanchez from behind at a crosswalk in Alhambra, CA, and Sanchez was pronounced dead after being transported to Huntington Hospital.
Ashley Sanchez, the victim's only child, filed a wrongful death and negligence lawsuit against Klinghoffer in July, alleging that distracted driving likely caused him to fail to brake in time.
"It was a tragic accident," Klinghoffer's attorney, Andrew Brettler, told TMZ at the time. "After Josh struck this pedestrian in the intersection, he immediately pulled over, stopped the car, called 911 and waited until police and the ambulance arrived. Obviously, he's cooperating with the police throughout the traffic investigation. This was purely a tragic accident."