In a suit and tie and tears, a Harmony man went to prison Thursday for causing a crash that killed his friend almost two years ago.

Alan J. Moser, 58, pleaded guilty to homicide by vehicle and drunken driving. Butler County Judge Timothy McCune sentenced Moser to four years in the county’s Intermediate Punishment Program.

Moser will spend the first three months in the county prison. After that, he will spend nine months on house arrest with electronic monitoring. For the rest of the program, he will be on probation.

The judge, in issuing the sentence and seeing the defendant’s emotional in-court apology, stressed the circumstances to about a dozen teens who were in the courtroom as part of Camp Cadet, a summer learning program run by the state police. McCune said “maybe something good” would come of the case if the teens were impacted and weighed their decisions more carefully because of it.

“You didn’t set out that day ... to kill your best friend,” McCune said to the tearful Moser.

By all accounts, Moser is an average man with no prior criminal record, a long work history and civic and church involvement.

On the day of the crash, Aug. 31, 2014, he and the victim, 44-year-old Daniel “Digger” Watson of Harmony, reportedly met for a few hours at the Harmony Moose lodge. According to court records, Moser later admitted he consumed several beers and shots of whiskey.

Moser’s defense attorney Dennis McCurdy said Moser and Watson were longtime good friends. McCurdy said Watson required a ride home, and Moser made that offer.

Less than 15 minutes later, Moser lost control of his Ford pickup going around a bend on Route 19 in Lancaster Township and hit a retaining wall and several mailboxes.

Watson, who was not wearing a seat belt, was pronounced dead at the scene.

Investigators said Moser had a blood-alcohol level around 0.22 percent after the accident, which is well over the legal limit of 0.08 percent.

Initially, Moser faced an additional charge of homicide by vehicle while driving under the influence of alcohol, a second-degree felony that carries a mandatory prison sentence of 3 to 6 years. That charge was dropped as part of a plea arrangement.

Assistant District Attorney Mark Lope, who prosecuted the case, said two factors that weighed most heavily in his decision were the defendant’s lack of a criminal record, and the support the defendant received from the victim’s family. Although it was not read in court, the judge also said he saw a letter by the family written in support of Moser.

“There were a lot of factors that went into this,” said McCurdy, who noted at the time of the crash his client was on medication because he had all his teeth removed and had an infection.