FAYETTEVILLE -- Trial began Tuesday for a Lincoln man charged with negligent homicide after an August car wreck killed his passenger.
Prosecutors say Kevin Fair Cain, 40, of Lincoln, had drugs in his system when he lost control of his vehicle and crashed into an embankment.
Negligent Homicide
The killing of another person through gross negligence or without malice. It often includes death that is the result of the negligent operation of a motor vehicle.
Source: uslegal.com
Danielle Bishop, 34, was a passenger in the 1994 Chevrolet pickup driven by Cain. The accident happened about 10:45 p.m. Aug. 27 just north of the Washington and Crawford county line on Arkansas 59.
Cain was northbound when he veered off the road into the ditch on the east side, over-corrected and traveled back across the road and hit an embankment on the west side of the highway head-on and rolled, Jason Davis, an Arkansas State Trooper, said. The vehicle then caught fire.
Bishop was badly burned in the fire. Attempts to resuscitate her at the scene were unsuccessful.
Davis said Cain was slurring his speech and could hardly stand. A breath test indicated Cain hadn't been drinking but he later told Davis and paramedics he had taken hydrocodone and Klonopin.
Davis believed Cain was under the influence and, because it was a fatal accident, he was required to order a blood test.
Don Riddle, a forensic toxicologist at the Arkansas State Crime Lab, said he found drugs in Cain's blood sample but could not say, based on the testing, whether or not Cain would have been impaired at the time of the wreck.
The defense contends having a positive drug test doesn't necessarily mean Cain was intoxicated.
Lonnie O'Bryant, the first person on scene, said the pickup was in the middle of the road on fire when he drove up on the wreck. Bishop was still inside and there were flames in the cab. Cain was standing outside the truck.
"She had her arms waving and she was screaming," O'Bryant said. "I tried to get her out but it was too hot."
O'Bryant said there was no cell service in the remote area so he went to a nearby house to call help. Bishop was somehow able to get out the window and crawl to the side of the highway, he said.
"She just had the will to get out of that truck. I don't know how," O'Bryant said. "That was not an easy thing to see. She was burnt bad, really bad."
Cain asked for a ride away from the scene then walked away up the highway carrying a duffle bag but was met by a county deputy who prevented him from leaving. Cain gave police fake names for himself and Bishop at the scene.
Dana Colvin, who lives nearby, said Cain asked her for a ride, saying he was on parole and needed to leave before police arrived. He also used her phone to call a ride.
Craig Harvey, the paramedic who treated and took Cain to the hospital, said Cain had singed hair and eyebrows, first and second-degree burns and several other cuts and scrapes. Cain told Harvey he removed Bishop from the fire.
The case is expected to resume at 9:30 a.m. today.
NW News on 04/08/2015