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EL woman pleads guilty to aggravated vehicular assault

LISBON — An East Liverpool woman who hit another vehicle head-on and injured five people in 2015 pleaded guilty last week to five counts of aggravated vehicular assault.

Jennifer N. Russell, 36, Summit Drive, East Liverpool, was driving on Nov. 16, 2015, followed by another driver who was recording her erratic driving, according to Chief Assistant Prosecutor John Gamble. Gamble said Russell failed to negotiate a curve on state Route 344 in her 2011 Chevy Traverse SUV and struck a 2012 Kia Sportage head-on.

The driver of that vehicle, Audrey Wiley, reportedly was not injured, but the adult passenger, Clifford W. McFarland, Sr., was injured and three of the four children on board were rendered unconscious due to their injuries, which included an extensive list with one child suffering a broken pelvis. At the time of the crash it was reported the children were all flown from St. Elizabeth’s Health Center in Youngstown to Akron Children’s Hospital.

Further, Gamble said Russell following the crash had a blood alcohol content of .229, which is nearly three times the legal limit.

Russell, who was charged in the case in 2017, appeared before Judge C. Ashley Pike with two defense attorneys, Christopher Amato and Gerald Ingram. The sentencing hearing was scheduled on Dec. 14, before Pike’s term ends.

After the hearing, Ingram requested to be allowed to submit a sentencing memorandum and wanted to keep some of the physical evidence for sentencing out of the public record.

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