Accused showed range of emotions after deadly crash, impaired trial hears

A Dresden woman accused of causing her friend’s death in a single-vehicle crash in April 2021 showed a wide range of emotions after the incident, a Chatham court heard.

Arielle Wall, 21, pleaded not guilty to impaired driving causing death, dangerous operation of a vehicle causing death and having blood alcohol over the legal limit as her Superior Court trial opened in Chatham on Monday.

Wall was driving a vehicle that hit a tree on Longwoods Road, just west of Louisville, shortly after midnight on April 12, 2021. Passenger Gabrielle Emery, 19, of Dresden died at the scene.

The Crown called four Chatham-Kent police officers Tuesday, beginning with Const. Paul Hendrie, one of the first officers on the scene.

When Hendrie first encountered Wall at the scene, she was “hyperventilating and in a panicked state,” he tested.

Wall was “crying heavily” when she confirmed she was the driver, he said.

Hendrie also described seeing first responders tending to Emery. The crash felt the passenger side rear wheel into the back seat area, forcing Emery’s body over near the driver’s seat.

Wall’s demeanour was vastly different when two other Chatham-Kent officers encountered her later that morning after she’d been taken by ambulance to the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance emergency room in Chatham.

const. Cheryl McVicar tested she questioned Wall about what she and Emery were doing earlier in the evening. Wall told her they were with friends in the Downtown Chatham Centre’s covered parking garage, the officer said.

When McVicar asked Wall if they’d been drinking alcohol, she said Wall replied: “This is where I get into trouble . . . I don’t know how much Gabrielle had. I had couple (of drinks), but I was OK.”

After confirming Emery had died, and Wall had admitted she’d been drinking, McVicar said she arrested Wall for impaired driving causing death.

McVicar tested when she first interacted with Wall, she noticed her eyes were red and glassy, ​​but didn’t smell any alcoholic beverage.

Given what had happened, the officer tested she found it unusual that Wall seemed jovial and happy and was laughing while talking to paramedics at the hospital.

Investigating officer Const. Dan Carroll testified he found Wall “in good spirits” at the hospital. That surprised him, he added, considering she’d been in a serious car crash.

Assistant Crown attorney Nick Bazylko noted Carroll was informed Wall had been found to be impaired from a breath sample before the officer spoke with her.

He asked Carroll if he’d made any observations about the impairment issue.

“No, I didn’t,” the officer said.

Bazylko asked Carroll if there weren’t any signs of impairment or if he wasn’t looking for any.

“There wasn’t any,” Carroll said.

Defense lawyer Ken Marley raised the issue of Wall’s behavior at the hospital in cross-examining McVicar and Carroll.

He pointed out both officers had not seen Wall at the crash scene, where Hendrie had described her hyperventilating and crying.

Both officers agreed with Marley that people have different reactions to stressful situations, including crying uncontrollably to using humor as a way to cope.

As for the interactions with EMS, the officers agreed with Marley they didn’t know if Wall had been given any medication to help calm her down or if EMS were trying to distract her from the situation by talking about something else.

Marley also asked Carroll if he recalled, while interviewing Wall at the hospital, asking her if she could say one thing to “Gabby,” what would it be?

Carroll recalled Wall saying she was sorry and it should have been her, not her friend, who died.

He agreed with Marley that her statement was genuine.

const. Shawn Lavelle asked Wall a series of questions before taking breath samples from her at the hospital on April 12, 2021.

Lavelle said he asked Wall to describe how she felt her ability to drive was, on a scale of one to 10 for impairment. She indicated it was under a five, he said.

Lavelle also indicated in his report there was no odor of alcoholic beverage on her breath, her speech was good and her “attitude was co-operative and polite.”

When the trial continued Wednesday, Sgt. Jason Herder gave testimony about assisting Const. Todd Trahan, the lead officer in charge of creating a collision reconstruction report on the fatal crash.

Herder tested about utilizing a specialized 3-D scanner that uses a laser measuring device to create a three-dimensional rendering of a crash scene. The officer took 11 separate 360-degree scans, which generated 1.27 million points of measurement with an accuracy of 3.3 millimetres, plus or minus.

Herder said they returned to the crash scene three days later on April 15, 2021, during the day with dry road conditions to see if there was additional evidence that could assist in the investigation.

He said further markings on the road regarding the direction of the vehicle’s travel were seen.

Herder was also tasked with using crash data retrieval software from the vehicle’s airbag control module, while it was in a secured compound at Chatham Towing.

He added the software provides data from five seconds of pre-deployment or non-deployment of airbags, which indicated neither the driver’s airbag nor front passenger airbag deployed.

Art Dawson, a licensed auto mechanic for more than 50 years, gave expert testimony regarding his inspection of the Pontiac G6 car involved in the crash.

He tested not being able to test the electrical components, such as windshield wipers, because of the damage caused by the crash and the battery connection being cut.

Dawson said he didn’t find any failed or worn out components on the vehicle.

“Other than the crash damage, there were no other defects found,” he said.

The trial continues Thursday when a toxicology report from the Center of Forensic Sciences will be discussed along with the collision reconstruction report completed by Trahan.

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