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Wednesday, June 8, 2016 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Crash victim’s mom raises awareness about distracted driving
By Phil Wright
East Oregonian
PENDLETON (AP) —
Alexxyss Therwhanger was
18 when she got her first tat-
too: “I love you, Mom.”
Her mother, Shannon
Moulton, a tattoo enthusiast,
said she replied in ink as well
with “I love you more.”
The afternoon of Feb. 19
Alexxyss left a friend’s place
in Long Creek, a small town
in remote Grant County, and
headed north on Highway
395 in a 1998 Buick Century
to return to Hermiston. She
lived in Hermiston most of
her life and was staying there
again. South of Pilot Rock
she drifted into the other lane
and crashed head-on into a
Lincoln Continental.
The two occupants of that
car were injured. Alexxyss
died. She was 19.
Oregon State Police in-
vestigated and determined
Alexxyss was using her
smartphone throughout her
trip. Shannon, 42, now is rais-
ing awareness of the dangers
of distracted driving.
“This is my new project,”
she said. “I don’t want any
other family to have to go
through this.”
Shannon was at her
apartment in Richland,
Washington, plowing through
loads of laundry. She had not
had a night off in two weeks,
she said, when she got a text
message from her boss.
Both mother and daugh-
ter worked at the Tri-Cities
Residential Services in
Kennewick, Shannon as a
counselor and Alexxyss as
a caregiver, helping people
with disabilities improve their
social skills.
Shannon said only a
few people at work knew
Alexxyss was her daughter,
and the supervisor was texting
to ask if they were related.
Shannon said she suspect-
ed Alexxyss missed work,
maybe even quit. After all,
she was still a teen.
While talking to her boss,
she received a voice mail
from a police officer. When
she called back, the officer
asked to verify her address.
Less than 15 minutes later,
a police car arrived. Then a
second. And then a third car,
and out stepped the county
coroner.
“I knew at that point there
was not good news coming,”
she said.
She figured her father,
Rick Moulton of Hermiston,
had died. He is the brother-
in-law of Hermiston Police
Chief Jason Edmiston. That
makes Shannon his niece
through marriage.
She said a Richland po-
lice officer asked to talk with
her inside her apartment. She
pushed back and wanted to
know why they were at her
home.
“They told me Alexxyss
was in a car accident and was
killed at the scene,” she said.
Oregon State Police used
Alexxyss’s phone records to
determine a time line leading
up to the fatal crash. Lt. Mike
Turner, commander of the
esents...
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Pendleton office, said based
on the records and driving
time, Alexxyss never stopped
the car when she handled the
phone.
“Everywhere she had cov-
erage, she was texting, send-
ing and receiving texts, taking
calls, sharing and reviewing
Facebook pages,” Turner said.
Six minutes before the
crash, she shared a post on
Facebook, he said, and one
witness reported Alexxyss
was on the phone as she left
her lane.
“We don’t know she was
on her phone at the moment
of the crash,” Turner empha-
sized, “but she was certainly
distracted from the roadway
and not paying attention,
and that led to her crash and
death.”
The Oregon Department
of Transportation defines
distractions as “anything
that diverts your attention
away from focusing on your
primary task — operating
your vehicle — and respond-
ing to what is going on around
you.” The agency considers
distracted driving an epidemic
in Oregon.
From 2010-14 in Oregon,
according to the department,
distracted driving resulted in
16,987 crashes with 14,186
injuries and 58 fatalities.
Drivers reported to be
using a cellphone at the time
of the crash caused 1,419 of
those wrecks with 1,175 inju-
ries and 15 fatalities. Drivers
16 to 18 account for 131
crashes in that subset, which
resulted in 120 injuries but no
deaths.
Convictions in Oregon for
distracted driving during the
same period totaled 88,626.
The transportation depart-
ment contends there should
be more, but the distracted
driving law, Oregon Revised
Statue 811.507, does not take
into account how people are
using modern technology
while driving.
The law prohibits drivers
from communicating on a
hand-held device while driv-
ing, but the law says nothing
about using a smartphone to
listen to music, for example,
or as a navigation system or
to check social media. The
Oregon Court of Appeals on
Aug. 19, 2015, ruled a state
trooper did not have probable
cause to pull over a driver
after seeing her look down at
a mobile device in her hand
because he never saw her “put
the device up to her ear, move
her lips as if she were talk-
ing, or push any buttons.” The
appeals court found the state
law applies only to “use of a
mobile communication de-
vice for the purpose of voice
or text communication.”
Merely looking down at a
mobile device, according to
the appeals court, does not
violate the law.
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