The cause of a September accident that killed a Hartland woman as she returned from a birthday party with three children in the car was likely speed and alcohol, police said Friday.
The Sept. 27 crash on Raymond Road in Palmyra killed 29-year-old Aimee Lasco as she was driving home with her two daughters and a friend’s daughter in the car. Neighbors found the children wandering on the road shortly after the accident.
Maine State Police Trooper John York said the investigation into the crash is finished, and the cause is believed to have been speed and alcohol.
The speed limit in the area is 45 mph. Based on the impact of the crash and tire marks on the road, police believe Lasco was going faster than that, York said.
The accident was not reconstructed because there is no prosecution in the case, he said.
Police also found alcohol in Lasco’s system and believe it was a contributing factor, York said. He said her blood alcohol level was 0.071, which is less than the legal driving limit of 0.08, but alcohol is still believed to have contributed to the accident.
Lasco was driving her daughters Ryleigh, 7, and Ava, 4, and their friend Isabella Morse, 5, home to Hartland from a birthday party at the Palmyra Community Center on Route 2 when the car went off the road and hit a tree. The road was a back route to get back to Hartland.
The three children were injured in the crash, but none of their injuries was life-threatening.
After the accident, the girls climbed out of the wreckage and wandered about a half-mile up the road to a house to seek help.
A passer-by told Jessica Robinson, a friend of Lasco who lived nearby, about the girls, and she went to them and comforted them until help arrived.
The day after the crash at the scene of the accident, Robinson told the Morning Sentinel that Ryleigh said that just before the crash “it got really bumpy and Mommy couldn’t stop.”
Robinson said Ryleigh told her, “I tried to wake Mama up, and Mama said, ‘I’m tired’ and she couldn’t wake up.” Robinson added, “She said, ‘I know Mama’s dead.'”
Rachel Ohm can be contacted at 612-2368, or at:
rohm@centralmaine.com
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