Barbara Smith found out the charges against the man who killed her son in an automobile accident had been dropped when a reporter called her for a response.

Clarence Schott, 25, West Valley, was originally charged with driving under the influence, a Class A misdemeanor, after he hit and killed two little boys, ages 4 and 5. Smith's son Kyle was the younger of the pair, who were crossing Redwood Road at 4000 South on a tricycle.The motion for the dismissal of the charge came from prosecutors. Schott had a blood-alcohol level of .03, well below the state's legal limit of .08. Schott's attorney, Robert M. Archuleta, said expert wit

nesses con-cluded that the drug and alcohol traces would have had no adverse influence on his driving abilities.

Smith disagrees.

"He had no business being out on that road with even a trace of alcohol in him and without car insurance," she said. Schott pleaded guilty to driving without insurance, a Class B misdemeanor.

Because Schott had no insurance, Smith's car insurance policy had to foot the bill for funeral expenses, which ran about $6,800.

Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt recently vetoed a bill that would have attempted to identify drivers who don't have insurance. The plan would have taken information from insurance agents and matched it with vehicle registrations.

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But Archuleta told the Deseret News in an earlier interview that there was nothing Schott could have done to avoid the accident.

"We think tragically . . . that this accident would never have happened had they (the children) been properly supervised," he said.

Smith said the issue wasn't what the kids were doing there but how the accident occurred.

"What possessed those two boys to take off across the street and then come back, I'll never know."

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