What jurors heard before convicting Amber Peery in wrenching deaths of Topeka Girl Scouts

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What jurors heard before convicting Amber Peery in wrenching deaths of Topeka Girl Scouts

Making ******** U-turns has become “commonplace” on the 30-mile stretch of the Kansas Turnpike between Topeka and Admire, a defense attorney for Amber Peery told a Shawnee County District Court jury.

Attorney Vanessa Riebli on Thursday recalled how a Kansas Highway Patrol trooper had told jurors that drivers make U-turns in that area so often that authorities at times have had to block off gaps in the barrier walls to prevent it.

Riebli stressed that to convict Peery of felonies linked to the highway ****** deaths of three Girl Scouts, jurors needed to conclude her behavior constituted “a ****** deviation from the standard of care a reasonable person would observe under the same circumstances.”

Because drivers so commonly make U-turns — and because two other Girl Scout leaders driving in the same caravan with Peery had already done so — Peery’s behavior wasn’t a significant deviation, Riebli said.

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Defense attorney Vanessa Riebli, middle, questioned during her closing arguments the investigation efforts of the Kansas Highway Patrol and whether a truck driver was distracted when his truck and the vehicle of Amber Peery, right, crashed Oct. 8, 2022. Peery was convicted of five felonies Thursday in the deaths of three Girl Scouts, including her daughter.

Amber Peery was convicted in deaths of 3 Topeka Girl Scouts

Riebli spoke during closing arguments in the trial of Peery, whom a Shawnee County District Court jury subsequently convicted late Thursday afternoon of ******* that included five felonies linked to an Oct. 8, 2022, ****** that ******* three Girl Scouts on the Turnpike near Auburn.

Jurors found Peery guilty of three felony counts of involuntary manslaughter, two felony counts of aggravated battery and one count each of ******** to maintain a single lane and making a U-turn on an interstate highway.

The involuntary manslaughter charges filed by Shawnee County District Attorney Mike Kagay’s office were linked to the deaths of Laila El Azri Ennassari and Kylie Lunn, both 9, and Brooklyn Peery 8. Brooklyn was Amber Peery’s daughter

Amber Peery and her two other passengers — her daughter Carrington Peery, then 5, and Gabriella Ponomarez, then 9 — suffered injuries but survived. Amber Peery’s aggravated battery convictions were linked to the injuries suffered by those two ******.

Prosecutor: Everybody knows drivers mustn’t make U-turns through gaps

Assistant Shawnee County District Attorney Will Manly during closing arguments Thursday addressed whether Peery showed ****** negligence, saying no reasonable person would put lives at risk by making an ******** U-turn.

“Everybody knows” drivers are not supposed to do that, Manly said.

He recalled how — when potential jurors were asked during jury selection Monday if they’d ever made an ******** turn through a Turnpike gap — one man acknowledged he’d been ticketed for doing that, and said he regretted doing it.

Peery didn’t bother to pull over to wait for traffic to clear, prosecutor says

Manly added that Peery’s recklessness went beyond her act of simply making an ******** U-turn in that she didn’t even bother to pull over to the highway’s shoulder and wait for traffic to clear before she tried to do that.

Instead, he said, Peery sought to make that U-turn from the Turnpike’s right lane, at a time when she realized a semi-trailer had been following her.

Meanwhile, Manly said, forward-looking video from that semi, which struck the left rear of Peery’s van as she was tried to make the U-turn, showed a northbound car was coming toward the part of the highway she was trying to enter.

Riebli replied that Peery genuinely believed the semi was following her in the right lane and that the path was clear for her to make the U-turn.

Semi-trailer was going 69 mph at time of ******

Jurors were also told that to convict Peery of involuntary manslaughter and/or aggravated battery, they were required to conclude she drove recklessly and consciously in a manner that posed a substantial and unjustifiable risk to others.

Jurors were told that the fault or lack of fault of the other driver involved, 72-year-old Robert Russell, of Huntsville, Alabama, was among circumstances they were to consider in reaching their verdict.

Video shown at Peery’s trial showed the left rear of her van was hit by a southbound semi-trailer driven by Russell, whom testimony indicated was driving 69 mph in the 75-mph zone and using his cruise control.

Russell testified at Peery’s preliminary hearing that he had been southbound in the right lane when he saw Peery’s van ahead of him on the right shoulder, and he responded by moving to the left southbound lane.

Riebli stressed that forward-looking video taken from Russell’s truck showed Peery turned from the right southbound lane — not the right shoulder, as Russell had said — and that Peery activated her left blinker before turning.

Riebli said Russell never braked before the time of impact.

She pointed to testimony made during the trial by an expert witness for the defense, who said Russell’s braking would have enabled him to avoid the accident altogether or at least strike the van at the much slower speed of 36 mph.

Prosecutor: ‘The Kansas Highway Patrol didn’t do their job’

Riebli added that jurors should have reasonable doubt about Peery’s guilt because the Kansas Highway Patrol’s ******* to pursue numerous avenues of investigation it should have.

“The Kansas Highway Patrol didn’t do their job,” she said.

That agency’s investigation was “not even close” to being thorough, competent and complete, Riebli said, describing it as “neglectful.”

Riebli said investigators didn’t look at Russell’s cell phone, or search or photograph his truck’s cab area for evidence that he may have been distracted.

Investigators also didn’t interview Peery’s surviving passengers until one year and four months after the ******, Riebli said.

Defense attorney claimed, ‘Something was going on,’ with truck driver

She said that while the trucking company for which Russell worked, Western Flyer Express, provided investigators forward-looking video from his semi, it never told investigators about the existence of a separate video it had showing Russell that was taken inside the cab.

That video has since been lost, Riebli said.

“Something was going on” that day with Russell, Riebli said, suggesting he’d been “oblivious to his surroundings.”

Riebli said the video taken inside the truck’s cab may have made a difference in the case against Peery by revealing more about Russell’s state of mind at the time.

Riebli didn’t say the trucking company’s name during her closing arguments

That company wasn’t among defendants in a lawsuit linked to the ****** against defendants who included Peery and Girl Scouts of Northeast Kansas and Northwest Missouri.

A confidential settlement reached by the parties involved was considered at a hearing in June by Pottawatomie County District Court Judge Jeff Elder, who sealed the file entirely for that case.

KHP’s investigative effort ‘does not change what she did,’ prosecutor says

Manly defended Russell’s not having braked after pulling into the left lane.

“He doesn’t step on the brakes because he’s in the fast lane and the other car’s in the other lane,” he said.

The KHP could have done more to investigate the case, Manly said, then pointed at Peery and said, “But that doesn’t change what she did.”

Contact Tim Hrenchir at *****@*****.tld or 785-213-5934.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal:

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