After three hours of advice, a jury of Porter County spoke on Thursday in all charges in connection with a fatal car accident in a pond in which the man's girlfriend was killed and the couple's toddler was critically injured, a Michigan City man from Michigan.
The jury received the case early Thursday afternoon on the fourth day of the court proceedings against Marcus Wright, 35, from Michigan City. He was charged with three crimes and an offense that was connected to the crash on March 25, 2022 in an Ardendale Road pond in Pine Township.
22-year-old Alisa Oman died of the consequences of injuries in the crash and in Wright and Oman, Marcus Xavier Oman, who is now 4 1/2, suffered “life-changing injuries”.
A tearful Wright hugged his lawyer Mark Chargualaf after the jury left the courtroom.
Anyone who stood behind the steering wheel of the car was the critical question for the jury to determine responsibility for the crash.
The deputy public prosecutor Kiré Pavlovski and Harris Peterson, Kiré Pavlovski, explained during their final arguments on Thursday that all evidence indicates that Wright is behind the steering wheel.
Blood tests showed that Wright was the twice as many legal alcohol limit in his system and was tested positively for marijuana.
Chargualaf does not contest that Wright was intoxicated and that the case is “terrible and tragic”. But Chargualaf said his customer was not guilty because he was a passenger in the car in the car and Alisa Oman drove.
“Marcus never fluctuated. He was not the driver and the brakes of the car went out,” said Chargualaf.
After the car had turned over and crashed on the head into the pond, Wright crawled out of the vehicle's vehicle door, said Chargualaf.
Further evidence that Chargualaf was quoted was the expert identification of Mitchell Kirk, a car mechanic.
The witness of the public prosecutor had stated that the brake fluid could end when the car rise. However, Kirk's statement for the defense was that the cap for the Master cylinder for the brakes still looked intact, so that the liquid could not be leaked through.
Chargaulaf also pointed to a scratch on the left side of Alisa Oman's Head, which could show that she hit her head on the window of the driver's side.
However, the public prosecutor's team countered that their expert showed that the brakes for the 2000s Buick Lesabre were still in operation. Peterson noticed that the centrifugal power of the car would have caused the injury to Alisa Oman's head, while Wright had no facial injuries.
Another point that Peterson and Pavlovski did was when Alisa Oman drove the car, she set the seat near the steering wheel. The seat was 2.34 feet from the bike, which was the position that Wright liked.
Peterson also noticed that the electrical system had closed because the car was under water, so that the seating position could not be moved after the crash.
In addition, Pavlovski cited evidence from Alisa Oman's text messages to a friend who was sent between 4:25 and 4:31 p.m. on that day, minutes before the crash at 4:36 p.m.
One of her last messages got how difficult it was “hazily and raining”.
“Would she have written an SMS while she drove her child in the car?” Pavlovski said.
Wright could be exposed to two to 12 years and a fine of 10,000 US dollars for every fee of the company during the intoxicating death and operation and operation during the intoxicating catastrophic injuries. He is also charged with level 6 for an operation crime, while he is intoxicated with a child under the age of 18 and an offense against operation with a blood alcohol of over 0.15 percent.
Jim Woods is a freelance reporter for the post-tribune.
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