Former corrections officer Kenneth Morang, in court with attorney Amy Fairfield, pleads not guilty in January 2020 to manslaughter in a crash that killed 9-year-old Raelynn Bell in Gorham in 2019. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer
The mother of a 9-year-old girl who died after a Cumberland County corrections officer fell asleep at the wheel and crashed his truck into the family car says her grief remains sharp and intense.
“She is the first thing I think about when I wake up, and she is the last thing I pray about as I fall asleep,” Charity Chillington told the Press Herald Thursday in a two-page letter. “3 years and 3 months … of not just losing her but being reminded of the accident, the loss and the trauma every time a court date changed, continued, another hearing was set, or another meeting was scheduled to discuss trial.”
On Monday, Kenneth Morang, 64, will go on trial for manslaughter in the death of Chillington’s daughter, Raelynn Bell. At the time of the crash, Morang told police he had fallen asleep at the wheel of his pickup after working his second consecutive 16-hour shift at the Cumberland County Jail.
Raelynn Bell GoFundMe
He rear-ended the family’s Honda SUV as the Bells were on the way home from seeing the new Lion King movie at a theater in Westbrook.
Raelynn never regained consciousness and died of a traumatic brain injury days later. She had just finished third grade at Mabel I. Wilson Elementary School in Cumberland, where peers and staff remembered her generosity, friendliness and radiant smile.
Chillington said her daughter laughed easily and loved abundantly. She enjoyed dancing, the beach, and baking – and even helped make her own ninth birthday cake less than two weeks before her death.
“She was our daughter, sister, cousin, niece, granddaughter, or friend,” Chillington wrote in the letter. “Raelynn is woven into every fiber of our family, our lives, and our hearts.”
Morang pleaded not guilty to manslaughter in January 2020. He’s been allowed to remain free on personal recognizance bail while he awaits trial.
During a hearing in April, Morang’s attorney, Amy Fairfield, asked the judge to throw out testimony from Daniel Young, a Gorham police detective. Morang’s family members testified that when Young questioned him at the hospital, the detective promised there would be no criminal charges.
Young denied making any such promises and the judge ruled Morang’s statements were voluntary.
Leading up to the trial, Fairfield and Deputy District Attorney Justine McGettigan and Assistant District Attorney Thaddeus West, both of York County, have been debating which evidence the jury will be allowed to consider.
Although the trial will take place at the Cumberland County Superior Courthouse, the case is being prosecuted by York County district attorneys because Morang worked for Cumberland County.
The jury will determine whether Morang recklessly or by criminal negligence caused Raelynn’s death. He could face up to 30 years in state prison.
Morang was driving home from work on July 21, 2019, when he rear-ended the Bell family’s car, with Raelynn, her two siblings and her father inside.
COULDN’T HIT BRAKES FAST ENOUGH
Morang later told police that he couldn’t hit his brakes fast enough, and his Ford F-150 crashed into their car so hard that it pushed them into oncoming traffic. Six people – including the driver of a third car, the Bell family and Morang – were transported to the hospital.
Attorney Walt McKee, who represented the family after the crash, said Thursday that all civil claims against the driver were resolved in early 2021. He would not say how.
Kenneth Morang, a former corrections officer, leaves court in 2020 after pleading not guilty to a manslaughter charge in the death of 9-year-old Raelynn Bell. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer
Morang resigned from the Cumberland County Jail in November 2019. Sheriff Kevin Joyce told the Press Herald that his resignation was the result of injuries he sustained in the crash, and praised him for being a dedicated employee.
During his 13 years at the jail, Morang had a history of working long hours, according to information from the sheriff’s office in 2020. The week of the crash, Morang worked 88 hours at the jail. He started his last shift at 11 p.m. on Saturday, July 20, 2019, and ended at 2:27 p.m. the next day, roughly half an hour before the crash. All of the shifts that week were voluntary, the sheriff has said.
QUESTIONS ABOUT OVERTIME
The tragedy raised questions about the extensive overtime worked by some corrections officers because of staffing shortages.
After Morang was indicted, Joyce said the department was negotiating with the corrections union to develop a policy “that doesn’t unduly limit an employee’s desire to work overtime while fulfilling the needs of the organization’s vacant shifts.”
Before he retired, Morang earned $20.99 per hour, or a gross salary of about $43,659. He clocked 2,654.5 hours of overtime worth an additional $82,750 in 2018, and was on track to continue working a lot of overtime the next year. Through the week before the crash, Morang had worked 1,671.38 overtime hours in 2019, according to county records.
Staffing shortages have only worsened at the Cumberland County Jail, where in September the U.S. Marshals Service removed federal inmates because there weren’t enough officers to oversee them.
The jail had 87 vacancies out of 185 authorized positions in the first week of September, not counting employees on temporary leave. The remaining 100 or so officers are forced to work up to three overtime shifts every week, a limit recently negotiated by the corrections officers’ union.
Joyce has closed the jail for all but the most serious offenses, which include severe violence, domestic violence, warrants of arrest and assaults on a police officer.
Cumberland County has hired a full-time recruiter for the jail using American Rescue Plan Act money, and is using applicant-tracking software to engage with candidates via text. The county also is offering $4,000 hiring bonuses and $1,200 referral bonuses for employees that attract a successful applicant.
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