Man pleads guilty to Misdemeanor Death by Vehicle in 2018 fatal bike crash
WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A Wilmington man has pled guilty to his role in a fatal crash involving a bicyclist in 2018.
Brett Matthews was sentenced recently by the Honorable G. Frank Jones after pleading guilty to Misdemeanor Death by Vehicle.
Jones sentenced Matthews to 60 days suspended with 18 months of unsupervised probation.
Back on October 26, 2018 around 9:25 pm, the Wilmington Police Department was dispatched to the intersection of Gregory Road and Banbury Lane, where they found William Edward Batson dead in the road.
Police say Matthews and two of his friends were standing on the side of the roadway.
Officer Bramley approached the Matthews and immediately detected an odor of alcohol coming from the Defendant.
Police say Matthews admitted to driving his F-250 pick-up truck on Gregory Road and said when he went to turn left onto Banbury Lane, he didn’t see anything coming in his direction, so he proceeded to make the left turn and that is when he felt something hit his truck.
He got out of the truck and found the victim lying in the roadway a few feet from a bicycle.
Matthews moved his truck to a nearby driveway and one of his passengers called 911.
Matthews’ two passengers did not see what happened, police say.
The Defendant admitted to drinking two beers while at dinner around 5:00 p.m. and said he had not consumed any additional alcohol since that time.
During Officer Bramley’s investigation, he was able to determine that the victim lived a few houses down from where the crash took place. The victim’s father, Mr. Edward Batson, told officers that earlier that night he and his son had been watching television and having an evening cocktail when his son ran out to grab a pack of cigarettes on his bicycle. The next time he saw his son was when he walked up to the crash scene and saw his son lying in the roadway.
A recreation of the scene was conducted by the Wilmington Police Department’s Traffic Unit. Police say there is conflicting information from witnesses regarding the position of the victim’s bicycle in the roadway prior to the collision. Whether the victim’s vehicle was in the correct lane of travel, the opposite lane of travel, or in the middle of the road, is unclear. One witness said the roadway leading up to the intersection was too dark to see the victim on his bicycle.
Matthews submitted to a chemical analysis of his breath, which indicated a breath alcohol concentration of 0.08 grams of alcohol per 210 liters of breath, resulting in his recent sentencing nearly 4 years after the incident.
