Driver convicted of third-degree murder in crash that killed a pregnant woman in Montco

A West Virginia man who lost control of a dump truck last year and caused a crash that killed a pregnant woman and her unborn child has been convicted of two counts of third-degree murder.

Everett Clayton, 57, will be sentenced in the coming weeks for his role in the death of Kellie Adams, 31, who was eight months pregnant at the time. A Montgomery County jury deliberated for three hours Wednesday before reaching the verdict.

Here is how the three-day trial before Montgomery County Court Judge William Carpenter played out.

Clayton, of Charleston, W.Va., was behind the wheel of a Ford F650 XLT Super Duty dump truck on Aug. 25, 2022, when he took a curve too sharply on South Park Avenue in Lower Providence Township and lost control, prosecutors said.

Video recorded by Clayton as he drove, and played during the trial, showed him speeding for nearly 30 minutes before the crash as he attempted to keep up with a pickup truck he was following to a construction site where he was working.

During the trip, Clayton stopped abruptly multiple times to avoid hitting the pickup, and at one point veered into oncoming traffic to avoid a landscaping trailer partially blocking his lane.

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That maneuver, referred to as a “near miss” by prosecutors, caused two vehicles to swerve to avoid the dump truck.

Minutes later, Clayton was driving nearly 60 mph as he approached the curve on South Park Avenue, which has a posted speed limit of 25 mph, and started to veer again into the opposite lane, prosecutors said. He then swung the truck sharply to the right, and had to make another sharp turn as the truck fishtailed and nearly ran off the road.

That second sharp swing put him into the direct path of Adams’ Chevrolet Tahoe, which Clayton hit nearly head-on.

Adams’ husband, Jason, said Wednesday afternoon that the jury’s decision brought his family some solace on a day that would have been the first birthday of his daughter, whom the family had named Emersyn.

“Nothing is going to bring her back,” he said. “However, the appropriate level of justice for Kellie and Emersyn we believe was served today.”

Dean Miller, Adams’ father, said he was grateful for the outpouring of support from the community in the year since the crash.

“We have the outcome we desired to get,” Miller said. “It won’t bring them back, but gives us a point where we can say this is done, and we can move on.”

The impact of the crash was so hard, according to experts who testified during the trial, that the Tahoe was pushed more than 40 feet off the road into a grassy area.

The dump truck flipped onto its side with enough force to bend its frame and shear off the heavy bolts that attached the truck’s body to its frame, according to testimony from Dennis DeWane, a certified mechanic who examined the vehicles for investigators.

DeWane said he had only seen such damage once before in his decades-long career. DeWane, in his testimony, noted that the dump truck was uninspected and uninsured, but ultimately determined that no mechanical defect had led to the crash.

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Clayton did not have a valid driver’s license at the time of the crash. He had a blood-alcohol level of .076, just under the legal limit, and admitted to investigators that he drank beer before getting behind the wheel of the dump truck. Several empty cans were still in the vehicle at the time of the crash.

Benjamin Cooper, one of Clayton’s attorneys, said in his closing argument Wednesday that the crash that killed Adams was a “terrible accident.” But he urged jurors to convict Clayton of homicide by vehicle and involuntary manslaughter, saying that his actions did not rise to the level of a deliberate murder.

“We have conceded he ignored traffic law. We conceded that he was reckless,” Cooper said. “We’re not disputing that. What we are disputing here was that he was in the mindset that by driving in such a way, he knew something horrible would happen.”

Instead, Cooper said his client was driving on an unfamiliar road, stressed about following his supervisor’s pickup truck as it sped ahead of him. He had been told, Cooper said, that he “better not lose that truck.”

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Cooper noted that Clayton fully cooperated with police after crash, and handed over his cell phone at their request.

“If someone is going to be called a murderer by his fellow citizens, this is someone who acts as if they are ready to fire a loaded gun,” Cooper said. “That is not what this guy did. He did not intend to cause harm.

“He made mistakes and he will pay for them.”

After the verdict was read Wednesday, Cooper’s cocounsel, James Lyons, said he will likely file an appeal on Clayton’s behalf. Lyons said that while he respected the jury’s decision, he did not believe that prosecutors had presented evidence that Clayton’s actions amounted to murder.

First Assistant District Attorney Ed McCann said that homicide by vehicle “doesn’t reflect justice in this case or the full scope of what [Clayton] did.”

“I know none of us do our best on the roads all the time, but none of us drive 18,000-pound dump trucks across the county,” McCann told the jury in his closing argument. “This is not a regular car. You don’t survive a crash against an 18,000-pound truck when you’re driving an SUV.”

McCann urged jurors to rely on their common sense, and to look at the evidence presented, including the video of the crash. He noted that, at times, Clayton cursed and wondered aloud where he was going, betraying a frustrated mindset.

“Anyone who did what this defendant did, operating an 18,000-pound dump truck after drinking, without a license, shows a disregard for human life,” McCann said.

Later Wednesday, McCann said he was gratified and relieved by the outcome of the case and the closure it brought Adams’ family.

“The evidence showed that he drove an 18,000-lb truck like a sports car,” he said. “Based on all the circumstances, I felt third-degree murder was warranted.”