Laurel: To bringing home the gold. Having Western Pennsylvania represented in the Olympics is nothing new. There is a long history of athletes from across the region taking up the mantle of Team USA — or showing up for other nations. Pittsburgh Penguins stars such as Mario Lemieux, Sidney Crosby and Jaromir Jagr all medaled for their home countries.
This year, the hardware came home.
Goalie Ava McNaughton of Seven Fields, Butler County, was one of four Pittsburgh Penguins Elite Girls Hockey program participants on the gold-winning women’s hockey team. The New York Rangers’ J.T. Miller, an East Palestine, Ohio, native and former Coraopolis resident, and Pittsburgh-born Vincent Trocheck took the top of the podium with the men’s team.
There was a bronze for Hempfield graduate Jasmine Jones in the two-woman bobsled.
But perhaps the most unexpected piece of gold-medal action comes back to North Hills with a kid who was just watching. High school sophomore Joseph “Trip” Cillo attended the women’s finals in Italy with his family. He caught a puck when Canadian defender Ella Shelton hit it over the glass.
Medals were awarded, memories were cemented and Southwestern Pennsylvania ended up in the Olympic story again.
Lance: To the bottom line. We do not know what Roxanne Bonnoni, 11, would have done with her life. She might have been a stay-at-home mom or a corporate attorney. She might have been an Oscar winner. She might have worked for minimum wage.
What we do know is her life was worth more than $1,450.
Yet that is what the formulaic arithmetic of Pennsylvania law and sentencing set as half of the penalty for the Harrison girl’s death. The other half is the three to six months in jail Jeffrey Glowatski, 65, of Harrison will serve for killing her in an August 2024 crash while driving under the influence.
In reality, the breakdown in court documents shows Glowatski’s time behind bars is only for driving with a blood-alcohol content between 0.10 and 0.16. The only penalty for Bonnoni’s death is for the summary charge — essentially a traffic ticket —for careless driving with unintentional death. The fine for that was just $500.
The charges in this case made it impossible for the sentence to reflect the Bonnoni family’s loss. But to make the consequences of killing a child a price that is the equivalent of a car payment is no consequence at all.
