Ex-NJ Transit bus driver in fatal pedestrian accident draws probationary term
Former NJ Transit bus driver Catherine Collier, 67, with attorney Kenyatta Stewart at her sentencing Friday.
A former NJ Transit bus driver was sentenced Friday to three years’ probation for causing a crash that killed a pedestrian in Passaic last year.
“It was not my intention for this to happen,” Catherine Collier, 67, said at her sentencing in state Superior Court in Paterson.
Collier also was sentenced to a one-year suspended jail term, which she will not have to serve if she completes probation without violations.
THOMAS E. FRANKLIN / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Assistant Prosecutor Michael DeMarco with Carmela Currier, mother of Joseph Currier, 49, who was struck and killed in 2012 by the bus Collier was driving.
Judge Adam Jacobs also ordered Collier to perform 150 hours of community service geared towards educating young adults about safe driving — “That is the only positive message that can come from this double tragedy,” the judge said.
Collier was charged with vehicular homicide after the bus she was driving struck and killed 49-year-old Joseph Currier of Passaic on Sept. 27, 2012.
Authorities said Currier was a passenger in the Route 74U bus that Collier was driving. He got off the bus near Main and Brook avenues and was in a crosswalk on Main Avenue when he was hit by the bus, they said.
Passaic County prosecutors said Collier accelerated at an intersection as the traffic light was turning from yellow to red, and ended up running a red light before hitting Currier.
Collier initially was charged with a second-degree offense, but later pleaded guilty to a fourth-degree charge of assault-by-auto.
Currier’s mother, Carmela Currier, said at the sentencing on Friday that she was devastated by the loss of her son.
“This has hit me very, very hard,” she said, asking the judge for a stiff sentence. “His life was taken away. I like to see justice done for my son.”
Collier later apologized to Currier.
“I want you to know that anything I can do for you, I will do it from the bottom of my heart,” she said to Currier.
Collier’s attorney, Kenyatta Stewart, said his client deserved leniency because she has never been in trouble with the law in her life. Stewart also referred to the fatal crash as an accident.
“I use the word ‘accident’ because she never meant for this to happen,” Stewart said.
Collier worked for NJ Transit for more than 25 years and was eligible for retirement in 2011, but continued to drive because she did not want to stay home, Stewart said.
Administrators at NJ Transit have said Collier left the agency in December 2013.
Email: markos@northjersey.com
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