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Driver of Fatal Hayride Acquitted on Criminal Charges

A South Paris man has been found not guilty of reckless conduct in connection with a fatal hayride accident that killed an Oakland teenager in 2014.

Prosecutors tried to show that David Brown was criminally reckless in driving a jeep pulling the hay wagon at a farm in Mechanic Falls. Investigators found that mechanical failure caused the hayride to plunge down an embankment and crash into a tree.

But Brown, who still works as a professional driver, said he was not aware of any brake issues. And his attorney, Allan Lobozzo, argued that just the day before the accident, Brown had reported a carburetor problem that was fixed.

Lobozzo says there is a lot of relief in the verdict but no joy.

“Because there’s a young woman, a beautiful young woman who didn’t come out of those woods alive that night,” he says. “But for David Brown it’s been, without question, the longest and most difficult two years of his life.”

Seventeen-year-old Cassidy Charette was killed and 20 other people injured, including Brown himself. Lobozzo says Brown has relived the accident every day since it happened.

“But to get this behind him, I think, is huge,” he says. “The state had made a number of offers a number of times and had simply been resolute in his feeling that there was absolutely no way he was going to plead guilty to something he felt he didn’t do.”

In addition, Lobozzo argued that the state of Maine does not regulate the operation of recreational hayrides.

An attorney for the Charette family released a statement saying that “not guilty” in a criminal case does not mean “not responsible” and they remain focused on a a separate civil lawsuit and finding other meaningful ways to honor Cassidy.