N.J. teacher’s aide who downed shots, smoked pot before fatal crash pleads guilty

A teacher’s aide who police say admitted drinking and smoking pot before a crash that killed a bicyclist in Salem County has pleaded guilty in the case.
Deandra L. Brown Palmer, 44, of Swedesboro, was driving westbound on Shirley Road in Upper Pittsgrove Township shortly before 7 p.m. on July 2 when he passed a car in front of him and struck Douglass W. Nutt, 62, as he rode his bicycle on the eastbound shoulder of the roadway, according to police.
Nutt, an Upper Pittsgrove resident, died at the scene.
Brown Palmer kept driving west without stopping, then made a U-turn and drove back through the crash scene, again without stopping, police said.
Witnesses called 911 and an Elmer Police Department officer tried to stop the car, but Brown Palmer continued driving and made another U-turn, heading back on westbound Shirley Road, authorities said.
The driver of a fire truck saw the pursuit and parked his truck across the roadway, prompting Brown Palmer to stop, a prosecutor said during a July court hearing, characterizing the effort to stop the driver as a “short pursuit.”
Police then discovered that Brown Palmer had a 3-year-old child in the backseat.
During an interview with police, Brown Palmer claimed he didn’t recall the crash, authorities said.
He admitted consuming five or six shots of vodka and whiskey and smoking an unknown amount of marijuana about 30 minutes before driving, according to prosecutors.
A grand jury indicted Brown Palmer in September on charges including first-degree aggravated manslaughter and second-degree counts of death by auto, endangering the welfare of a child and eluding a police officer.
Under a plea agreement, he admitted last week to a second-degree death by auto charge, according to court documents. The other charges will be dismissed as part of the proposed deal.
The prosecutor’s office will recommend a seven-year prison term, with a requirement that he serve 85% of that time before he’s eligible for parole, when Brown Palmer is sentenced Dec. 3.
He’s also subject to three years of parole and a five-year driver’s license suspension under the agreement.
At the time of his arrest, Brown Palmer was employed as an instructional aide in the Bridgeton school district, a district official confirmed.
His attorney, V. Scott Macom, previously told a judge that Brown Palmer’s behavior in the crash was an “aberrant occurrence” and said “this man is deeply remorseful for what happened, even though he doesn’t know what happened or how it happened.”
Speaking at a July hearing, Brown Palmer said he had turned his life around in the last 15 years, went to college, got married and raised five children and a grandchild.
“I love my community,” he said. “I had one bad incident.”
Nutt, the bicyclist killed in the crash, was a 1980 Woodstown High School graduate who went on to earn a business degree and spent a long career in the insurance industry, according to his obituary.
He was remembered as a loving husband, father and grandfather.
Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.
Matt Gray may be reached at [email protected].