Fatal Massachusetts crash leads to sentence

On behalf of Aiken and Aiken P.C. Personal Injury Attorneys posted in Wrongful Death, on Tuesday, July 22, 2014

On July 15, a woman was sentenced in relation to a fatal crash that occurred in Randolph on Sept. 10, 2011. The fatal accident took place when convicted woman was driving an SUV and trying to merge onto Route 24 when she crashed into a vehicle that was traveling south. The second vehicle began to spin because of the impact and rolled over several times. A 57-year-old Easton woman was thrown from the vehicle as it rolled over. She suffered massive head and lower-body trauma and was declared dead at the scene. Two other people in that vehicle, a man and a woman, suffered serious injuries and were transported to Boston Medical Center. The driver of the SUV admitted that she had been drinking prior to the accident. Her BAC level was .13 percent more than an hour after the accident, higher than Massachusetts’ legal limit of .08 percent. The woman was convicted in June of motor vehicle homicide while operating under the influence, negligent motor vehicle operation and two counts of serious bodily injury while operating a vehicle under the influence. She was sentenced to one year in jail, five years of probation and 250 hours of community service. She also lost her driver’s license. When someone dies because of an intoxicated driver, the results of the criminal case can be used as evidence in civil proceedings if the family of the decedent chooses to file a wrongful death claim. A criminal conviction might provide proof of how the driver’s negligent actions caused the death. The civil case may lead to both exemplary and punitive damages for the family if the driver’s actions are found to have been willfully negligent or reckless. Source: WCVB, “Hairdresser sentenced in 2011 fatal drunken-driving crash“, July 15, 2014