Judge denies motion to suppress evidence in deadly Swan Boat Club crash case
MONROE, Mich. (CBS DETROIT) - A 66-year-old woman accused of driving drunk and crashing into a birthday party at the Swan Boat Club in Berlin Township in April 2024, killing two children and injuring several others, was in court Monday.
Monday's Walker Hearing was a final effort for the defense to suppress statements they say were involuntarily made while defendant Marshella Chidester was being questioned at the scene last April.
Chidester is charged with two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of operating while intoxicated causing a death, and four counts of operating while intoxicated causing serious injury.
Chidester was in court for Monday's hearing.
Her attorney, Bill Colovos, filed motions to dismiss three interviews she did with law enforcement, and the judge denied all three.
Judge Daniel White of the 38th Circuit Court ruled that the first interview was investigatory in nature, similar to the questions an officer would ask after pulling someone over for a traffic stop, and didn't require reading of Miranda rights.
White said the second interview, even with conduct in question due to the deputy having his body cam audio turned off, won't be suppressed because there wasn't any audio anyway.
The motion to suppress the third interview was based on Chidester telling a deputy, quote, "No, I'm good," when asked if she wanted to talk to the officer. The deputy followed up to clarify with her response before she eventually consented to speak with an officer. He gave his reasoning after dismissing the third motion.
"A waiver can be making an uncoerced statement. I find these statements were voluntarily, knowingly, intelligently made, that she was advised to rights, that she knowingly waived those rights, and accordingly the motion to suppress those matters is denied," said White.
While the prosecution will still be able to use these statements at trial, the defense filed a motion to keep them from using what could be considered the most important piece of evidence, Chidester's blood alcohol test results.
"When they took the blood, when they were supposed to preserve the blood when they transported the blood, and when the blood was tested, all of it was faulty. I don't just say that lightly; I've been doing it 35 years; there's a lot of flaws there," said Colovos.
Colovos claims handling of this evidence could have raised the amount of alcohol in that sample.
"If you don't have a proper preservative in it, then what happens is that it starts fermenting and it starts going up. Where you could be a .02 could all the sudden become a .18 or a .20 because it's fermenting for days," he said.
A hearing on this evidence is set for Feb. 21. Chidester's trial is scheduled to start on March 3.
