BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) – A judge has barred prosecutors from telling jurors about a former astronaut’s drunken driving conviction during his upcoming trial over a wreck that killed two young sisters in rural Alabama.
Tuscaloosa County Circuit Judge Allen May issued the ruling Tuesday in the reckless murder case against retired NASA space shuttle pilot James Halsell, 63, who has pleaded not guilty.
Halsell is set to go on trial in early March in a car crash that killed two girls and severely injured their father and a woman in 2016. May agreed with defense claims that prosecutors shouldn’t be able to use evidence of Halsell’s 2014 DUI conviction in California since tests showed no alcohol in his system after the Alabama wreck.
But Halsell refused to voluntarily submit to a blood test after the Alabama crash, prosecutors wrote in a court document. That resulted in a delay in testing while authorities sought a court order to allow a test that eventually showed no alcohol in his system, they said.
“He should not now be allowed to have this information excluded,” prosecutors said in written arguments.