November 23, 2024
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Snowsled operator dies in Newry

A Massachusetts woman was killed Monday on a snowmobile in western Maine, bringing the state’s death toll to three in three days and prompting warnings from game wardens for snowmobile operators to slow down.

The accidents were worrisome because school break means the trails will continue to be busy with families throughout the remainder of the week, said Lt. Michael Marshall of the Maine Warden Service.

“Slow down and drive prudently,” Marshall said from his office in Ashland. “Use common sense.”

Driver inexperience was blamed for Monday’s death of Cathy Frasier, 40, of Cotuit, Mass., Marshall said.

She was the last in a line of snowmobiles that included her husband and two daughters in Newry when her machine darted ahead of the others, hit a rock and went airborne, Marshall said. She died after hitting some rocks and trees.

The accident came after a deadly weekend in which a New Gloucester teenager became the first snowmobile fatality of the season and a Wales man was killed by a snowmobile while out for a stroll.

In Wales, a snowmobile operator was charged with manslaughter after allegedly running over a man and leaving him on the ice Sunday night.

Steven Davies, 36, of Sabattus was charged with manslaughter, and Robert Cyr, 33, of Sabattus was charged with hindering apprehension, Marshall said. Davies was held on $50,000 cash bail at the Androscoggin County Jail while Cyr was released on $1,000 cash bail.

The victim, Robert Levesque, 58, of Wales, was walking on Sabattus Pond when he was hit at about 9 p.m. Sunday, Marshall said.

Levesque was alive when he was found but he died at Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, a nursing supervisor said.

The investigation led law enforcement officials to Davies, who confessed to hitting Levesque with his snowmobile, Marshall said.

On Saturday, Michael Huff, 15, was killed when he drove into a chain that closed off part of a road in Gray, Marshall said.

The chain blocked off the portion of the road beyond the last home. Marshall said the chain was marked with flags but that the boy may not have seen it because it was dark and because of some mounds of dirt.


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