Truck driver will go to trial for injuring Marion teen
Staff reporter
J.B. Miser, 64, will face a jury of his peers for aggravated battery and four misdemeanor charges related to a fiery crash May 10, 2004, on U.S.-50, just west of the Marion County line.
Eighteen-year-old Ashley Billbe's life changed forever on that day. The soft-spoken woman took the stand on her own behalf Friday afternoon in the Harvey County Courtroom.
While on the stand, Harvey County Attorney David Yoder asked Billbe what she remembered.
"I can't remember anything," she answered. Her first memory is waking up in a hospital bed at Via Christi-St. Francis in Wichita.
She remained in the hospital for seven months, recovering from critical injuries that included the removal of a kidney, spleen, three-fourths of her pancreas, some intestines, a shattered right arm, and nerve damage to her left leg.
Prior to Billbe's testimony, Kansas Highway Patrol Troopers Mike Ottensmeier and Kale Collins and Kansas Department of Transportation employee Edward Robinson Jr. also provided testimonies about the multi-vehicle collision.
Collins testified that he ordered blood and urine samples at Wesley Medical Center where Miser was treated for injuries. He also obtained a statement from Miser. The truck driver stated he had looked up and saw a white car but didn't know he hit anything.
Miser was pulled from his tractor-trailer just before the vehicle became engulfed in flames. Much of the evidence in the truck was destroyed in the fire.
Harvey County Judge Theodore Ice saw and heard enough evidence to have the Emporia truck driver bound over for trial.
By way of his attorney, Douglas Jones, Miser waived a plea hearing and pleaded not guilty to all charges. Pre-trial motions will be heard at 11 a.m. Tuesday, and a jury trial will be held Nov. 29 and 30.
The trial was to be held in Marion County but it was determined just before the trial began that the accident actually occurred in Harvey County. The confusion was caused when the location of the new highway was changed. Previously, that stretch of highway between Peabody and Walton was partly in Marion County and partly in Harvey County.
Billbe was a passenger in a van that was struck from behind by a tractor-trailer driven by Miser while a line of vehicles was stopped for road construction. Brandi Billbe, 40, and Lori Leeders, 43, were killed in the crash.
The charges and penalties against Miser are aggravated battery, 31-136 months with Secretary of Corrections and a fine not to exceed $300,000; two counts of vehicular homicide, imprisonment and fine not to exceed one year and $2,500 for each charge; reckless driving, not less than five days nor more than 90 in Harvey County Jail and a fine not less than $25 or more than $500; and failure to comply with traffic regulations in road construction zone, which is considered a traffic infraction.
This collision was the first in a series of three that occurred that summer claiming nine lives on U.S.-50 in construction zones.
Michael Hardwick was found not guilty of vehicular homicide Sept. 27 in the deaths of two men on June 28. Richard Duncan pleaded guilty Oct. 30 to five counts of vehicular homicide as a result of a crash that occurred June 29 on that same stretch of highway. As a result of plea bargaining, Duncan will serve a total of 30 months, 24 of them in an Illinois prison where he currently is incarcerated for an unrelated crime. Upon his release from prison, he will return to Marion County to serve the final six months of his sentence. No fine was imposed.
