An 83-year-old man was sentenced to one year of probation after pleading guilty to vehicular manslaughter in a 2024 crash that killed a 39-year-old woman in Santa Maria, the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday.
Prosecutors said David Ernest Baskett negligently moved a large forklift onto Skyway Drive and stopped it with its front tires at the end of the road. The forklift’s 8-foot-long forks extended into the traffic lane, elevated about 4 feet off the ground, roughly the height of an oncoming vehicle’s windshield.
Baskett then apparently left the forklift in that position without posting any warnings for oncoming traffic, the DA’s Office said…