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Woman faces prison in death of motorcyclist
YOUNGSTOWN
An impatient Tasha L. Moore recklessly went left of center around stopped vehicles at a motorcycle- accident scene and ran over the motorcyclist lying on the pavement, dragging him 60 feet before witnesses got her to stop, all while talking on her cellular phone, a prosecutor said.
However, Moore’s lawyer told jurors they need to consider a variety of factors in the crash that killed the motorcyclist, including the dark, poorly lit street, the previous impact from another vehicle that threw the motorcyclist 20 feet to the pavement, and the motorcyclist’s intoxicated state.
Robert J. Andrews, an assistant Mahoning County prosecutor, and Walter Madison, Moore’s lawyer, made their comments Tuesday in their opening statements in Moore’s aggravated vehicular homicide trial before Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of common pleas court.
The nine-woman, three-man jury heard opening statements after returning from a visit to the location of the 6:30 p.m. March 2, 2010, crash that killed Charles T. Mulligan at the scene in the 3500 block of South Avenue.
Moore, 29, of Jackson Street, Campbell, who Andrews said drove a car without a valid driver’s license, faces a possible two-to-eight-year prison term if she’s convicted.
Mulligan, 48, of South Avenue, Boardman, was southbound in the passing lane on South Avenue when a car pulled into his path from a parking lot, Andrews said.
After that car hit him, Mulligan was thrown to the pavement into the middle of South Avenue, and the motorcycle hit a northbound car, Andrews said.
Moore was southbound in a line of traffic that had stopped because of the accident, Andrews said.
“At this time, the defendant decides she’s not going to wait in line. She pulls out into the northbound lanes and goes around the vehicles that are stopped,” before running over Mulligan, Andrews added.
“Mr. Mulligan’s body was severely mangled, and you’re going to hear that many of those injuries were injuries that are consistent with someone being crushed underneath a car,” Andrews told the jurors based on what he said they’d hear from Dr. Joseph Ohr, forensic pathologist and deputy coroner.
“No one can tell you which one of these blunt-force traumas killed him,” Madison said of the multiple impacts Mulligan experienced.
Madison also said Mulligan didn’t have a valid driver’s license, and he cited the coroner’s finding that Mulligan’s blood- alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit.
“You must weigh his behavior as a contributing factor to his own expiration,” Madison said.
It is undetermined whether Mulligan wore a helmet, he added.
“This is not a court of emotion. This is a court of law,” Madison told the jurors. “The law is your guiding light.”