Montana man may be spared prison for felony DUI

January 3, 2011

A Montana man who admitted drinking, driving erratically, crashing his truck into a vehicle bound for the Mother's Day Moyie Mud Bog, injuring three young women and then fleeing the scene of the accident has been given the chance to avoid up to nine years as an inmate in the Idaho State Prison. In a plea agreement, Logan Brent Moore, 21, Thompson Falls, pled guilty last week to aggravated DUI, a felony, and had misdemeanor charges of leaving the scene of an injury accident, possession of a controlled substance and possession of paraphernalia dismissed. According to court documents, Idaho State Police Corporal Allen Ashby responded to a call from Boundary County Sheriff's Dispatchers of an injury collision on Eileen Road at about 2:14 p.m. May 6 a little over a mile north of Highway 2. ISP Trooper Chris Yount, who was less than a mile from the scene when the report came in, radioed that he saw a red Dodge Durango speeding away from the scene, a vehicle Ashby noticed in the parking lot at the Moyie Store. While Yount went to the assistance at the accident scene, where an empty white 1995 GMC Sierra pickup lay on its side and a 1996 Honda Accord sat smashed head on, three women injured inside, Ashby stopped at the store to check out the Durango. He found a young man sobbing in the back seat, being comforted by a young woman, who told Ashby he'd been fish-tailing south, gotten into a crash and that he'd been drinking. He told Ashby he ran away from the accident because he was scared. Ashby identified him as Moore, and, because he matched the description of one of two people witnesses to the collision reported running away, placed him under arrest. In the process, Moore refused to submit to field sobriety tests, saying that he was too drunk to comply; according to Ashby, even without the "official" results or the admission, the evidence was fairly clear. Meanwhile, at the scene, Corporal Yount was going through the GMC, where he found a container of what he suspected was marijuana as well as drug paraphernalia. While EMTs tended the three young women in the Accord, he sized up the crash site and logged the evidence. EMTs, meanwhile, were treating three then 20-year-old victims who'd been driving north to enjoy to Mud Bog; driver Jayme Hahn, Osburn, Idaho, who'd suffered the worst injuries, a compound fracture of her left arm, a partial scalping and multiple lacerations and contusions; and Kershanda Nicholson and Kaitlyn Fausett, both of Wallace, had both suffered injury, though less severe. Moore was sentenced to a potential nine years in prison, and given credit for the 226 days he's already served in county jail, but his prison sentence was commuted and judgement withheld; meaning he'll have the opportunity to serve six months at Cottonwood and, if he successfully passes that strict regimen to the satisfaction of his jailers and his judge, he can come back to the court and request parole; a period of time during which he'll be free, but always subject to strict oversight to ensure he abides the terms and conditions set. If the judge has any reason to doubt, however, the sentence can be imposed in full.