Mistrial declared in fatal Apple Valley hit-and-run

A Dakota County judge on Thursday declared a mistrial in a fatal hit-and-run case after the jury deadlocked.

Minutes after the decision, the parents of Joan LeVasseur, who died a week after she was struck in March 2009 while crossing Cedar Avenue S. in Apple Valley, expressed frustration.

On Wednesday, jurors had sent Judge David Knutson a note saying that they were at a stalemate in considering the charges against Eric James Hunter, 41, of Rosemount. Two of the 12 jurors had been unable to reach a guilty verdict after three days of deliberation.

In addition, on Thursday, a third juror asked the judge whether he could be excused from deliberations should they continue into next week because he had tickets to a sporting event.

"I am so frustrated that I can't even think," LeVasseur's mother, Patty Boever of Farmington, said after receiving news of the jury's deadlock.

Her 26-year-old daughter, known as Joanie, lived in Apple Valley. She was hit on March 6, 2009, while running across Cedar at 153rd Street, and died a week later at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis.

Months later, Hunter was charged with two felony counts of leaving the scene of a fatal accident and also of driving after his license was suspended.

Said Patty Boever: "It's not what we wanted, but we still have a chance at him."

There's no question that the car Hunter was driving struck LeVasseur, who was deaf. The question that the jury grappled with was whether Hunter knew that he had struck a person before driving off without stopping or calling police.

Hunter testified in his own defense during the nine-day trial in Hastings, telling the jury that he didn't know what he had hit that Friday night. He claimed it wasn't until five days later, when he saw a news article about the hit-and-run accident, that he realized he had hit a person -- and that she was being taken off life support.

"How could you not know that you hit a person?" Boever said.

She and her husband, Bob Boever, said that LeVasseur's head had broken through the windshield of the car Hunter was driving, leaving a hole the size of a bowling ball, bits of flesh and blood in the broken glass and a tuft of her dark hair at his feet, beneath the steering wheel.

LeVasseur had been in a crosswalk when she ran from the middle median across a northbound lane, against a red light. Because that caused the accident, the most serious charge that prosecutors could file against Hunter was leaving the scene of a fatal accident.

Had Hunter caused the accident -- or had he been found to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol -- he could have been charged with a greater crime: vehicular homicide.

"We're not talking about who's at fault," Golden told the jury. "What we're talking about is the defendant's obligation after he hit her to stop."

By the time police located and impounded the car five days after the accident, it was evident that somebody had wiped down the car where it was dented from LeVasseur's body, said Apple Valley police officer Jason Weishaar.

The victim's father, Leo LeVasseur of Otsego, said he believed that Hunter knew he hit a person. LeVasseur said his daughter had been running west to east, so she passed in front of the driver before he hit her with the right front of his vehicle, on the passenger side.