Maine drunken driver sentenced to 18 months

PORTLAND – A mother of three whose blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit when she caused a crash that left a young man paralyzed has been sentenced to 18 months in jail.

Katherine Bishop, 37, of Portland, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and aggravated drunken driving in connection with the June 2002 crash in which her minivan plowed into a pickup truck.

A passenger in the pickup, Keith Anderson, nearly died and had to endure months of intense and painful rehabilitation. The 22-year-old, who now lives in Rhode Island, cannot walk or use his fingers and can barely move his arms.

Anderson, who lived in Saco at the time, was riding in a pickup driven by a friend, Andrew Bailey of Buxton.

Bailey, 22, also was convicted of driving while impaired for having a blood alcohol content of 0.17 percent, though he was not found to have been at fault in the crash, authorities said.

Bishop, however, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and aggravated drunken driving, getting nine-month sentences for each, prosecutors said.

After her release, she faces four years of probation. She also must perform 500 hours of community service working at a spinal-cord rehabilitation facility or speaking publicly about the dangers of drunken driving.