Comment by wisty
16 hours ago
When a lawyer says "reckless" it's an extremely strong word. It doesn't mean "negligent", IANAL (and it depends on the state etc) but it's more like if you knowingly run over a pedestrian in your way, and you aren't trying to hurt them but don't care if they get hurt. And often criminal law will treat it as just a little less bad than intent.
It very much depends on where the lawyer is. What you’ve described would be more like “depraved heart” or “wicked recklessness” in jurisdictions that have it, where reckless was that you were doing 90 in a residential area. I think the point is more that the legal term “reckless” may have a specific meaning in given places.