More than 20 supporters of a Penn State professor who was struck and killed by a van while biking in March 2006 showed up yesterday to see the driver plead guilty to vehicular homicide.

Thomas B. Fry, 51, of Boalsburg, will be sentenced at 9 a.m. May 22 by a Centre County judge who will consider the plea agreement negotiated between attorneys.

If accepted, the plea agreement mandates nine months of house arrest and five years standard probation. Fry would also be restricted from obtaining a driver's license. Fry also pleaded guilty to reckless driving, careless driving and disregarding a traffic lane. Fry's charge of involuntary manslaughter was dismissed.

The victim, Bohdan Kulakowski, then 63, was biking

along Boalsburg Road on March 22, 2006, when Fry's van veered on to the road's shoulder and fatally struck Kulakowski, according to court documents. Kulakowski taught mechanical engineering at Penn State and worked at the Pennsylvania Transportation Institute (PTI).

State College police said Fry has a degenerative eye disease, which was diagnosed in the 1980s, and is considered legally blind.

Presiding Judge Charles Brown briefly sifted through two folders of letters from Kulakowski's family and supporters expressing their disagreement with Fry's plea bargain.

The agreement is "lenient," most notably because Fry will not serve any time in prison, said David Klinikowski, a PTI employee who worked with Kulakowski.

Fry's lawyer, Ron McGlaughlin, said he is aware that the plea agreement will not satisfy several people.

"The real sentence for Fry is that he lives with this for the rest of his life," he said.

McGlaughlin told the court earlier that since the accident, Fry was prescribed three anti-depressant medications and another to combat anxiety.

Centre County District Attorney Michael Madeira said the plea agreement falls within the standard range of sentencing for a homicide by vehicle charge.

"What the commonwealth recognized is the tragedy of the event and yet the restraints we had," he said.

Madeira said he has told supporters who are unhappy about the plea agreement that if he had taken the chance and wasn't able to prove Fry driving blind caused the accident, "there would have been no accountability."

Kulakowski family friends, Ed and Rosemary Walsh, said they wished someone had stopped Fry from driving.

"It was a complete tragedy. Then when you see the guy shouldn't have been driving," Ed Walsh said, " ... it's certainly a tremendous blow to the family."

Rosemary Walsh said this accident should be seen as an example.

"Everyone is going to have to give up that freedom to drive some day for others' safety," she said.