Staff Writer 

If you ask Scarborough resident Steve Campbell, 39-year-old Donna Bartlett is a “monster.”

“Imagine a drunk person getting into a 5,000-pound block of steel, getting on the highway and killing your son,” he said during court proceedings last week. “If that isn’t a monster, I don’t know what is.”

Bartlett pleaded guilty to eight charges, including vehicular manslaughter, for an accident on Interstate-95 last spring when her blue Chevrolet Tahoe collided with a Lincoln Town Car owned by Maine Limousine. The limo driver, 65-year-old Gorham resident James McLaughlin, and his passenger, 15-year-old Cooper Campbell of Scarborough, died instantly from head injuries. Steve Campbell was transported to Maine Medical Center in Portland with broken ribs and multiple lacerations. 

“We had to press on his back and every time it felt like broken branches or twigs snapping under my hands. It also made a sound I will never forget,” Catherine Tarbox, Steve Campbell’s sister, said of her brother’s recovery.

Bartlett was driving south in the northbound lanes with a blood alcohol content of 0.19 – more than twice the legal limit of 0.08. Bartlett, who broke her ankle in the crash, will spend the next eight years in jail and be on probation for four years under a plea bargain approved last week by York County Superior Court Judge Arthur Brennan. 

York County District Attorney Mark Lawrence said if Bartlett violates her probation she could be sentenced to up to 20 years in jail and five years on probation. Brennan said the eight-year sentence was “above the median” for manslaughter cases in Maine but less than the 30-year maximum allowed penalty.

“Did Donna Bartlett intend to kill anybody that day? My judgment is no,” Brennan said. “There aren’t a lot of cases like this, but there are a few.”

During the sentencing hearing, York County Assistant District Attorney Brian Roberts detailed circumstances leading up to the crash. He said Bartlett brought two bottles of wine to a house in Wells where she and two of her friends “had a joyful conversation” about her 8- and 11-year old children. 

After drinking a majority of one of the bottles of wine, Roberts said Bartlett decided to leave around 10:30 p.m. Although Bartlett did not appear drunk to her friends, they asked if she wanted to spend the night or have her husband pick her up rather than drive home. Bartlett refused the offer, got into her SUV and left, Roberts said. 

“That decision she made while on the front porch of the house was a decision that started a chain of events that brought us here,” Roberts said during Bartlett’s hearing. “It has created a lifetime of sadness for so many families, including her own.”

It wasn’t the first time Bartlett had gotten behind the wheel after drinking; Roberts said she paid nearly $500 in fines associated with an OUI violation in 1992 and was involved in an accident in 1989 with a blood alcohol content of 0.12. 

“The facts are a little unclear,” Roberts said of the 1989 crash. “The vehicle went off the road and struck a tree. There was a passenger in the car and on the scene, but [Bartlett] apparently left and drove to a store. No charges were pressed in that case.”

On April 28 last year, Bartlett drove onto the exit 19 off ramp going in the wrong direction, swerved into the median and hit a sign before driving south in the northbound lanes, Brennan said. Within minutes, state police trooper Philip Alexander saw the SUV and attempted to pull Bartlett over. Roberts said Bartlett continued to drive 65 miles an hour in the wrong direction, nearly missed a dozen cars traveling the other way and clipped two vehicles before colliding with the Town Car at mile marker 13.5 in York. Steve Campbell and his son, Cooper Campbell, were on their way home to Scarborough after what Steve Campbell described as a “magical vacation.”

“Mile marker 14 is where my life stopped and where my son’s life ended,” Steve Campbell said. “The only thing that stopped [Bartlett] was the steel of the Town Car and the bones and flesh of James McLaughlin and Cooper. I believe Donna Bartlett is a menace.”

More than one person in the York County Superior Courtroom is convinced Bartlett was not beyond rehabilitation.

“She is not a habitual offender, she is not an irresponsible person and not the monster depicted by the media,” Beverly Bartlett, Donna Bartlett’s aunt, said during the hearing. “She is a warm, compassionate and caring woman. She could be the girl next door, that girl you want to know.”

Roberts said the state considered Bartlett a “good candidate” for probation and Brennan said he did not expect Bartlett to drink and drive again. Rosemary Greenwood is a therapist who has met with Bartlett since the accident. She said Bartlett demonstrated an unprecedented level of regret concerning her decisions last April.

“In 26 years, I have never encountered anyone like [Bartlett],” Greenwood said. “She has lived every day, every moment since [the crash] with pain and anguish. She recognizes alcohol played a large part and accepts sobriety.”

James Martemucci is an attorney who represented Bartlett in civil proceedings after the crash. During the civil case, he said Bartlett frequently refused to allow him to “do all the things that defense attorneys can do” to delay a court ruling.

“She wanted everything that could be done to take place and get it done as quickly as possible,” Martemucci said. “She has waited for this day.”

Bartlett said she is “a good person who made a terrible and irreversible decision.”

“I know that my time in jail will be spent trying to make me a stronger person,” she said. 

After accepting the sentencing recommended by Bartlett’s lawyer and Roberts, Brennan encouraged the families affected by the crash to begin the healing process as quickly as possible. 

“There is a place in your hearts and minds for righteous anger. For some people in your situation, that anger becomes all-consuming,” he said. “It would be an additional tragedy if your families’ hurt, over an appropriate amount of time, does not heal.”

Staff Writer Nate Jones may be reached at 282-4337 ext. 233.