Guilty Verdict Upheld In Keansburg Fatal Texting While Driving

KEANSBURG, NJ — This week, a New Jersey state appeals court upheld a guilty verdict of vehicular homicide in the state's first-ever texting-while-driving criminal trial, where a woman crossing the street was killed.

It happened in Hazlet in 2016; the woman who appealed her guilty verdict is Keansburg resident Alexandra Mansonet, 51.

The woman who was killed was 39-year-old Yuwen Wang, who lived in Hazlet.

As Patch reported, Mansonet was convicted in 2020 of second-degree reckless vehicular homicide, plus reckless driving and use of a phone in a moving vehicle. She was sentenced by a Monmouth County judge to five years in prison.

But her lawyer always vowed to appeal her guilty verdict.

The fatal crash happened at 8:15 a.m. on September 28, 2016: Mansonet was driving a Mercedes Benz south down Laurel Avenue, headed to work. She approached Laurel Avenue and Sixth Street, where another car was already stopped. Police say she rear-ended that car just as Wang was walking in front of it.

The force of the impact propelled the vehicle into Wang, throwing her into the air and her head smashed against the sidewalk when she landed.

Wang suffered severe head injuries and the medical team airlifted her to a trauma center. Wang died a few days later, on October 3, 2016. The cause of death was the blunt force trauma.

Keansburg Police and county detectives pulled surveillance videos from the crash, which showed that Mansonet's brake lights did not activate at any point before she struck the car in front of her. Her tires also made no skid marks. Plus , several eyewitnesses said they never saw her slow down. One eyewitness testified she saw her looking down into her lap as she drove toward the other vehicle.

This showed police that she was not looking at the road ahead of her while she drove.

The day after the fatal crash, the police searched her phone and found she read a text she received from her former sister-in law at 8:18:22 a.m. This was a little over one minute before she hit the car. The two women planned to meet in New York City for dinner that day. Denise's text stated, "Cuban, American or Mexican. Pick one."

Police found she had typed the letters "Me," which they assumed to be the first two letters of the word "Mexican," as a response to the text. However, police testified the text was not sent and there was no way to determine when she typed it.

Mansonet told detectives she plugged her phone into her car's speakers when she left home. She heard the text message come in and read it. She said she could not remember typing the letters "Me."

She also said she did not see the other car until it was too late to stop, and that she had pushed a button in her car to turn on the rear defogger. She did not recall seeing any of the eyewitnesses as she drove.

Mansonet agreed the crash would not have occurred if she had been looking forward the entire time she was driving as she approached the intersection, according to the appeals court decision.

The state appeals court published their opinion on Tuesday of this week, March 15. You can read it here: https://www.njcourts.gov/attor...

Mansonet will remain in prison. She must serve 85 percent of her five-year sentence before she can be released.

Initial Patch report: Keansburg Woman Charged In NJ's First Texting-While-Driving Trial (Nov. 2019)

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