Legislators to meet next week on Ravnsborg impeachment

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) — South Dakota legislators are set to meet next week to deliberate whether Republican Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg should be impeached for his conduct surrounding a fatal car crash last year.

A select committee of nine House members will convene on Tuesday and Wednesday to develop a recommendation to the full body on whether it should impeach Ravnsborg, the Sioux Falls Argus Leader reported.

Ravnsborg was driving home to Pierre from a politcal fundraiser on Sept. 12, 2020, when he struck Joseph Boever as Boever was walking on the side of the highway. Ravnsborg told a 911 dispatcher he wasn’t sure what he hit and it might have been a deer. He said he didn’t realize he had hit a person until he returned to the crash scene the next day and found Boever’s body.

He pleaded no contest this past August to making an illegal lane change and using a phone while drive. He was fined $500 for each count and had to pay $3,742 in court costs.

The select committee will have access to investigators’ evidence during its deliberations. Rep. Jon Hansen said he doesn’t know what the committee might recommend but to him it matters where Ravnsborg was when he hit Boever. When he reported the collision he said he was driving in the middle of the highway but investigators believe he was driving on the shoulder.