BANGOR, Maine — The appeal of a woman convicted last year of manslaughter and leaving the scene of an accident in which two teens died will be considered Wednesday by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court when justices convene at the Penobscot Judicial Center.
The case of Kristina Lowe, 22, of Oxford is one of 17 that the state’s high court will hear in Bangor over three days beginning Tuesday. She was sentenced in October in Oxford County Superior Court to eight years in prison with all but 18 months suspended, followed by three years of probation. She is free on bail pending the outcome of her appeal, according to her attorney, James Howaniec of Lewiston.
Media reports before the trial said that Lowe had been texting when she lost control of her 2002 Subaru Impreza in the early morning hours of Jan. 7, 2012, on Route 219 in West Paris, and went 60 feet off the road and crashed into some trees. Testimony at the trial showed that Lowe received a text “at the instant of the accident” but never replied to it, her attorney wrote.
Oxford Hills teens Rebecca Mason, 16, and Logan Dam, 19, who were passengers in Lowe’s vehicle, died in the crash.
Howaniec argued in his brief that jurors, who found Lowe not guilty on two counts of aggravated operating while under the influence of intoxicants, wrongly found her guilty of the other charges.
“Ms. Lowe’s conduct at the time of the accident did not rise to the level of criminal recklessness or gross negligence required to sustain manslaughter convictions,” he said. “In glancing over at her cellphone, Ms. Lowe’s conduct was less negligent than that of adjusting a mirror, or looking at a pedestrian on the sidewalk, or changing the radio dial, or reading a GPS screen.”
He said that testimony showed Lowe was “neither reading nor manually composing electronic communications at the time of the accident or at any time for some two hours prior to the accident.” That is how the law defines texting, Howaniec wrote.
Oxford County Assistant District Attorney Joseph M. O’Connor disagreed in his brief. O’Connor said the jury made the correct decision. He wrote that “the primary evidence that the defendant was texting came from her own words” in testimony from friends witnesses who said Lowe told them she was texting and driving.
The prosecutor also said the defense’s claim that the roads were icy that night was rebutted by Maine State Police troopers who responded to the crash. O’Connor said the road was “a wide, well-paved, well-marked, recently-sanded and perfectly straight state highway when this crash occurred.”
There is no timetable under which the court must issue a decision.
Justices are scheduled to hear oral arguments on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in Bangor. The court has convened at the Penobscot Judicial Center at least once a year since the building was completed in November 2009.