‘Melrose Place’ actress faces 2nd re-sentencing for fatal 2010 crash
NEWARK » A former “Melrose Place” actress whose threeyear prison term for a fatal 2010 auto crash sparked outrage from the victim’s family and prompted legal appeals must return to court for a second re-sentencing.
A New Jersey appeals court ordered the new sentencing Friday for Amy Locane, writing that the trial judge’s re-imposing of the same sentence last year didn’t adhere to an earlier appellate ruling and didn’t take into account the severity of the crime.
“The trial judge’s legal analysis was not significantly different the second time he sentenced defendant than it was on the first,” the three-judge panel wrote. They ordered the re-sentencing to take place before a different judge.
James Wronko, an attorney for Locane, said Friday he was preparing an appeal to file with the state Supreme Court. Wronko said Locane “clearly acknowledges her role in this case and is extremely remorseful for what occurred.”
Locane, who acted in 13 episodes of the popular Fox series and also appeared in several movies, served about twoand-a-half years of a three-year sentence for the 2010 accident in Montgomery Township that killed 60-year-old Helene Seeman and seriously injured Seeman’s husband, Fred. She was released in 2015.
Locane was convicted of vehicular manslaughter, assault by auto and other offenses and faced a sentencing range of five to 10 years on the most serious count.
Prosecutors had sought a seven-year sentence.
Locane’s defense contended the crash was an accident, and that a third motorist, whose car the actress had bumped into at a traffic light in the minutes before the accident, distracted her by honking at her and chasing her after being rear-ended.