Jun 4, 2009 9:31 pm US/Central
Nun Denies Causing Fatal Accident
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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Marie Marot, 24, was found not guilty last month of causing a 2007 fatal crash in Elgin.
Courtesy Sun-Times
It's a story that's left victims angry.. And frustrated. Now a nun involved in a deadly 2007 crash is speaking out tonight for the first time.
She was charged with running a red light -- then acquitted. 2 Investigator Dave Savini has her story about what happened and whether justice was served.
Twenty-four-year-old sister Marie Marot shows us around the soup kitchen on Chicago's West Side run by Fraternite Notre Dame, the order she joined at age 17.
She works there and at this Algonquin bakery that the order also operates, donating the proceeds to those in need.
"I help people," Marot said.
Her days are long. On the day of this deadly crash she got up at 4:30am and was still going nearly 20 hours later, at 12:15am, when her van loaded with leftover baked goods for the soup kitchen was involved in this crash that killed 16-year-old Keith Forbes.
"I pray for the family and for the boy who passed away," she said.
Questions have been raised by crash victims as to how Marot was allowed to drive after such a long day.
Donald Brewer is Marot's lawyer.
"We don't know that she actually slept" on the day of the crash, he said.
Savini asked him: "Did she say that she slept?"
"She rested," the attorney said.
Sister Marot, who speaks primarily French, sat down with us and her translator.
"I have a lot of pain for this, I am not responsible for his death," she said.
Witnesses say she ran a red light, causing the crash, and she was charged with a red light traffic offense. She's facing civil lawsuits.
Her lawyers refused to allow her to talk about the crash or the events leading up to it. They did claim she had the green. But the police report says she didn't remember if her traffic-control light was green but thought it was.
Brewer says a police translator got it wrong. Immediately after the crash, Marot, who was not injured, used a cell phone to call another nun.
"Did she call 911?" Savini asked.
"No, she did not," Brewer said. "Part of it may be the language, I don't know."
Last month,
Marot was acquitted by a jury. Victims believe wearing a habit influenced the outcome. Brewer disagrees, saying jurors were not swayed "any more than they would be influenced by a policeman wearing his uniform."
While leaving court a photographer captured this smiling picture of her, further angering crash victims.
"For two years I have been accused of doing something that I didn't do," she explained through the translator. "And I think everyone would understand that after the two years that she would smile knowing that the truth has come out."
A witness had said Marot did not get out of the van to help the victims. Her attorneys say she was trapped in the vehicle.
They also say they were able to discredit a key witness, and they claim no other witnesses actually saw the red light.
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