AUBURN, Maine — One man was sent to the hospital and a woman earned a summons after an accident involving a motorcycle and sport utility vehicle Friday morning, police said.
Kathryn Libby, 52, of Leeds was heading southbound on the Maine Turnpike near mile marker 72 when she attempted to make a U-turn at a crossover, according to state Trooper Fern Cloutier.
When she slowed, Jeffrey Jones, 24, of Limington tried to avoid Libby but his Harley Davidson bike struck the Libby’s SUV, the trooper said.
Jones, who was not wearing a helmet, suffered a broken femur and a shoulder injury, according to Cloutier, and was taken to Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston for treatment.
Jones’ bike sustained $1,000 in damage while Libby suffered scrapes and bruises in the crash.
Libby was ticketed for attempting to make a U-turn on the turnpike, which is illegal, the trooper said.
How about aggravated assault with a motor vehicle. Why are there no consequences for crashing into people, cars, bicycles or motorcycles with cars because of inattention or, in this case, an illegal maneuver?
If his pipes had been louder, this, and any other accident involving a motorcycle, would never have happened.
At 65-75 MPH the sound wouldn’t have made a difference in this particular accident.
While driver inattention is a major problem, there is a certain risk assumed when riding motorcycles and the rest of us shouldn’t have to listen to unnecessarily loud motorcycles day and night.
It was meant to be sarcastic.
You succeeded!
and the general population has to listen to loud car mufflers and excessive bass on radios and the list goes on and on ..
my motto: if its too loud your too old!
My motto: people who make self-serving statements like yours should never pass up the opportunity to keep their mouths shut.
“there is a certain risk assumed when riding motorcycles” Why? Why should idiots not paying attention be a “assumed risk”? Why should it just be accepted that a certain number of Bikers will die because some folks have their heads up, well, you know.No, I wont accept this. I wont accept friends dying because of “inattention” and/ or some being troubled by bike exhaust.
And it’s obviously not just bikers. Plenty of people in every other type of automobile are also killed or injured by those idiots with their heads up their…….you know
You were holding down the sarcasm button when you posted that, weren’t you?
Ya..loud pipes and no helmets saves lifes.
This guy didn’t have a helmet. He is alive. Helmets don’t always save lives sometimes they kill as they snap necks. It should always be a choice of the driver.
It should be the choice of the driver of cars, if they want to wear seatbelts or not.
I don’t disagree with you. But you don’t make something else illegal, because they passed one bad law. It isn’t tit for tat. We have far too many invasive laws and we need to start putting more people in office that will vote for the people, the constitution and civil liberties. Unfortunately they have twisted the meanings of these so much that the average person wouldn’t recognize freedom if it bit him on the nose and they keep voting in people with false promises of imaginary free lunches.
Completely agree with your post. Thank you.
An accident is something that happens even after you do your best to drive properly. Everything else is no accident. Speeding, DUI, driving recklessly, passing where you shouldn’t, the mayhem caused by people making the decision to drive badly is not an accidental. This was a deliberate decision on her part, to drive dangerously, and someone else paid the price. No accident occurred. So Commutah, incidents of carnage on our roads needs to be separated out into two groups; accidents (your wheel unexpectedly falls off and you hit another car) and non-accidents which caused damage and/or injuries that occur because of bad decisions (you drove drunk, hit a tree, and killed your best friend). Then we need to prosecute for the carnage caused by bad decisions.
I agree with you, but in this case, the person who was hit, is the one who performed the illegal maneuver. The SUV slowed to make the illegal U-turn, and was hit by the bike. The wording of your post sounds like you want the motorcyclist charged, and he wasn’t in the wrong here.
If I took what you said wrong, I apologize, but that’s how it sounds to me.
Not at all how it reads.
Was he not wearing a helmet on his leg or shoulder? No reason for that statement other than to stir the helmet legality pot.
If you believe United Bikers of Maine, Loud Pipes Saves Lives. But, more importantly, UBM would have you believe that NOT wearing a helmet unquestionably saved this young man from certain death.
UBM…You would have a lot more credibility if you ditched the Loud Pipes Saves Lives mantra and sought legislation to require helmets so that your membership could live long enough to keep paying dues.
If you’re going to try spouting some backwards mantra at least get the organization right, it’s UBM. You obviously are clueless about what the UBM does.
Regardless… he would have the same injuries. I highly doubt that helmet would have protected him from those injuries..
And how is this related, sounds like you need to fall off the soap box and move along.
p.s Loud pipes do save lives, doesn’t take a MENSA member to figure out how it would be so.
This article has nothing to do with either. I truly wish all of you on your high horses would stop using articles to spout off about pipes and helmets. Neither of those things had anything to do with what occurred one way or the other.
Sounds like someone needs to call Joe Bornstein!
All she got was a ticket? She could have gotten this guy killed. She should have been arrested and spent a night in jail to think about her reckless behavior. Plus it might have sent a message to other reckless drivers on what’s going to happen when you pull these kinds of stupid stunts. The cop had a chance to make an example of her and he blew it.
She’s gonna have a civil suit on her hands.
Am I missing something here. I’ve reread the article several times and although I think they messed it up a bit, it sounds like the motorcycle struck the SUV in the rear when she slowed to make the illegal maneuver. If that’s the case it sounds like he was following too close and would have hit her no matter why she slowed down. If I’ve misread it I apologize but it sounds like there may be plenty of fault to go around.
She was on the interstate , 55-65 mph when she decided to throw on the brakes and turn into a flip-flop. Ive seen idiots do this before and you come up on them pretty quick , this poor guy never stood a chance if she did this abruptly or it was over a rise ect. There should be some way to spank her harder then what ever the fine for this is. Everyone knows you dont use these cross overs, for this very reason, lucky he didnt get killed.
I didn’t see anything about a rise or slamming on brakes. The article simply said she slowed down. I’ve had people do this to me as well at those speeds more than once. The difference is I had time and room enough to slow down and not hit them. On the other hand I’ve missed turns before because the vehicle behind me was riding my bumper so close that I didn’t dare to slow down for fear of getting slammed in the rear end. It definitely swings both ways out there. She was absolutely wrong for doing what she did but “if ” he was following too close to stop in a reasonable amount of time then he should shoulder some of the responsibility for the accident as well.
The person driving illegally is at fault. Don’t try to make excuses for them. This is a totally unexpected move on her part and as such anyone behind her has no reason to expect someone is slowing to a stop or just tapping their breaks to slow down. By the time that assessment is made it can be far too late. In this case it was. Luckily he was able to slow down enough to sustain some injuries instead of get killed. The woman driving should be in jail.
The person mite of has some on his right so he could not go around her no matter how you look at it she was at fault an will pay
Frome the Portland Press Herald:
“Jeffrey Jones of Limington was traveling northbound on his Harley-Davidson at about 7:30 a.m., following behind a Chevrolet sport utility vehicle driven by Kathryn Libby, 52, of Leeds when the SUV slowed rapidly as it approached a median crossover, said Maine State Police Trooper Fern Cloutier.The motorcycle swerved to the left of the SUV, which then turned into its path as it moved to enter the crossover, Cloutier said. The motorcycle hit the driver’s-side rear door and Jones was thrown into the crossover.”
Thank you for posting that. The driver of the motorcycle did everything he was supposed to do and still ended up getting squashed. I hope he retains a good lawyer and takes her for all she is worth.
I really love how the news tries to point out “was not wearing a helmet” when the injuries had nothing to do with helmet or not. I didnt see anything that said whether the driver in SUV was wearing a seat belt, or not. Biased reporting for sure!
All you loud pipe, no helmet wearing Hells Angels wannabes better “get it while you can” because change is coming to put an end to your excess noise and lack of safety gear. Pretty soon you’ll be required to wear dayglo orange and have a powerful strobe light on that new helmet. Oh yeah, this is going to be sweet revenge.
Actually the laws are very subjective and have no meat to them. I think you are going to be sadly disappointed. Another attempt by lawmakers to get your vote by not really doing anything for you.