FARMINGTON – A Massachusetts man pleaded guilty Thursday to a charge of manslaughter stemming from an utility terrain vehicle crash that claimed the life of his female passenger on a trail near Quill Hill Road in Redington Township.

Mathew Tolman, 27, of Hubbardston, was the driver of the side-by-side in the crash on July 1, 2023. Tolman, who was not wearing a seatbelt, was ejected from the vehicle and critically injured.

Abigail Divoll, 25, of Royalston, Massachusetts, who was wearing a seatbelt, remained  in the vehicle while it cartwheeled  and landed upside down, Assistant District Attorney Patricia Mador said.

Divoll later died of her injuries.

Tolman’s vehicle was in the lead of two other ATVs.

The group had rented an Airbnb in Rangeley, Mador said. She showed photos of the trail and the condition of the gravel and rocky trail, which had several water bars and about 31 washouts on it. The UTV crashed near one of the washouts.

A witness, the driver of the UTV behind Tolman’s, would have testified that he estimated the speed of the utility vehicle to be 35-40 mph at the time of the crash, she said. The witness called 911 to report the crash. The group turned the vehicle on to its wheels in an effort to give medical assistance to Divoll.

Witnesses saw the rear of the utility vehicle go up in the air and it cartwheeled end over end until it came to rest.

Several wardens from the Maine Warden Service and agents from U.S. Border Patrol and a NorthStar EMS ambulance crew responded to the scene. Tolman was flown by a LifeFlight medical helicopter to a Portland hospital. Those who responded would testify that they detected an odor of alcohol, Mador said.

By the time a warrant was received and blood was taken, Tolman’s blood alcohol level was .035%. A chemist would have testified that his blood alcohol level at the time of the crash would have ranged from 0.065% to 0.11%, Mador said. The legal limit to operate a vehicle in Maine is 0.08%.

Maine wardens used an ATV to travel a portion of the trail to reconstruct a crash. The information was passed onto a reconstructionist that used the data to determine an estimated speed. Safe operational speed would have been no more than 25 mph, Mador said. It was estimated the utility vehicle was going about 46 mph when the crash occurred.

Defense attorney Walter McKee said the data used came from a small vehicle and small truck, not a side-by-side. He disagreed with several pieces of the state’s evidence that was recited during court. He had several motions in limine filed in the case pertaining to speed and blood alcohol, he said.

A motion in limine is pretrial motion requesting the court to rule on the admissibility of specific evidence or arguments before they are introduced at trial.

McKee also disagreed with the reconstruction because it was done 10 days after the crash and the trail had changed, he said, with 2 inches of rain falling in the area.

The proposed sentence is a compromise, McKee said.

“Nobody is happy with it, the prosecution or the defense,” he said.

Tolman was sentenced to seven years with all but nine months suspended followed by 2 1/2 years of probation. During that time, Tolman would not be able to use or register an ATV, snowmobile or a utility terrain vehicle.

The court had received 27 letters in support of Divoll and her family. Several family members from both sides were in the courtroom.

Several of the family members testified in court over the loss of Divoll. She was described as caring, thoughtful, kind, loving, and an integral part of the family that was taken from them by an act that could have been prevented, several said. She had gone to college and worked as an accountant.

The nine-month sentence was insufficient compared to the loss they have suffered and will continue to suffer, several of Divoll’s family members said. They asked Justice Nancy Mills to stop the plea deal.

Tolman apologized for the pain he caused to her family.

“I accept the sentence and will begin serving immediately,” he said.

Mills said that plea agreement and sentencing had already gone through two judicial settlement conferences. She couldn’t change the sentencing agreement unless she threw it out and scheduled a trial, she said.

Mills said she has worked with both attorneys over the years and they are both highly regarded. If the case went to trial there are risks and there is no guarantee of conviction, she said. She read the four motions in limine that McKee had filed. In the one for blood alcohol level, she said there would have been a good chance the defense argument would prevail.

Mills credited the Maine Warden Service, including Warden Ethan Buuck, the primary investigating officer, for working hard to get an indictment in the case.

“If it had not been for the wardens there would be no charge,” Mill said.

Mills said she had read all of the letters submitted on behalf of Divoll several times.

One of them, from Mary Ward, said the case presented an “unwinnable situation.” Mills said she agreed.

The sentence is not a “measure of Abby’s life,” Mills said. “There are too many other factors that go into this case.”