Driver in fatal DUI refuses to testify
NORRISTOWN » An Upper Providence man will not testify at the trial at which he’s accused of operating an all-terrain vehicle while drunk and causing a two-vehicle crash on a township roadway that killed a passenger on his ATV.
“I’m not going to testify,” Steven Edward Gismonde Jr. revealed in Montgomery County Court on Monday, out of earshot of jurors, when questioned by his lawyer Carrie L. Allman.
Common Pleas Court Judge Steven C. Tolliver ordered jurors to return to court on Tuesday
morning to hear the lawyers’ closing statements and to receive his legal instructions. The jurors are expected to begin deliberating Gismonde’s fate by noon Tuesday.
Gismonde, 33, of the 1000 block of South Lewis Road, faces charges of homicide by vehicle while DUI, homicide by vehicle, accidents involving death while not properly licensed, DUI and multiple summary traffic violations in connection with the 2:35 a.m. Dec. 24, 2016, ATV crash that killed his passenger, 21-year-old Sydney Hunter Stone of Trappe.
With the charges, prosecutors alleged Gismonde’s blood-alcohol content was 0.135 percent, above the legal driving limit of 0.08 percent, at the time of the
crash. Additionally, Gismonde was not licensed to operate a motor vehicle in Pennsylvania and had a suspended driver’s license in the state of New Jersey, prosecutors alleged.
If he’s convicted of homicide by vehicle while DUI, Gismonde could face a mandatory sentence of three years in prison.
Allman and Assistant District Attorney Kathleen McLaughlin each wrapped up their cases on Monday with crash reconstruction experts with opposing points of view.
Upper Providence Police Sgt. Daniel Mulligan, who leads that department’s crash reconstruction unit, testified the investigation began when township police responded to the intersection of Main Street and Greenwood Avenue for a report of a motor vehicle crash involving a 2005 Suzuki King Quad all-terrain vehicle and
a 2012 Honda Civic. Arriving officers found Gismonde and Stone lying on the roadway, having been ejected from the ATV, and suffering serious injuries.
The investigation, according to Mulligan, determined the ATV, allegedly operated by Gismonde, was traveling southbound on Greenwood Avenue approaching Main Street, or Ridge Pike, when Gismonde failed to stop for a posted stop sign or failed to yield for the Honda, operated by Jayme Earhart and traveling westbound on Main Street.
Mulligan testified that crash scene measurements, the nature of Stone’s injuries, including evidence that part of an Ugg boot she was wearing on her left foot was found wedged in the rear wheel well area of the ATV, and Earhart’s statements provided sufficient evidence that Stone was the passenger
on the ATV.
“My opinion is that Steven Gismonde was the operator of that ATV,” Mulligan testified. “Taking all the pieces of the puzzle and putting them together, it’s my opinion he was the operator.”
But James Halikman, an accident reconstruction expert called by the defense, testified that while he agreed the ATV operator was at fault for the crash he found the prosecution’s conclusion that Gismonde was the operator of the ATV, “unacceptable.”
“There’s no physical evidence to truly identify who the driver was,” Halikman testified.
During the trial, Allman has argued prosecutors don’t have sufficient evidence to prove that Gismonde was driving the ATV and she suggested Stone could have been behind the wheel.
McLaughlin has argued the nature of Stone’s “crushing” leg injury, which she suggested occurred when Stone’s leg became pinned briefly between the ATV and the Honda upon impact, confirmed Stone was the passenger. McLaughlin also suggested that the fractured thumb Gismonde sustained occurred as he gripped the handlebars of the ATV as the vehicles collided, additional evidence that he was the driver.
Earhart, the driver of the Honda, testified during the trial that her recollection of the Ugg boots and the way Stone’s legs were positioned on the ATV led her to conclude that Stone was the passenger. Earhart testified the passenger in the rear of the ATV was wearing Ugg boots.
The ATV hit the front passenger side of the Honda and the impact caused the ATV “to ride up onto the hood of the Honda,” ejecting
Gismonde and Stone from the ATV, according to a criminal complaint filed by Mulligan.
Gismonde was transported to Paoli Hospital for treatment of head injuries, police said.
Emergency medical officials told investigators they detected a “strong odor of the elements of alcohol about the breath of Gismonde.”
Authorities alleged Gismonde operated the ATV while under the influence of alcohol to a degree “that rendered him incapable of safe operation of a motor vehicle.”
Stone was transported to Pottstown Memorial Medical Center where she was pronounced dead. An autopsy determined the cause of Stone’s death was multiple injuries to the head. Stone had no alcohol in her system at the time of her death, testimony revealed.