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Murder charge denied for road rage incident By JOHN
MUNFORD A Fayette County grand jury has declined to indict a Sharpsburg man on murder charges for the death of a Fayetteville woman who was killed May 10 in what police called a road rage incident. Instead, Paul Samuel Gardner Jr., 32, was indicted for two counts of vehicular homicide and one count each of reckless driving, felony hit and run and speeding. The indictment was unsealed in court Tuesday, and the grand jury also passed on indicting Gardner for two counts of aggravated assault. Gardner is accused of causing the death of Kera Nicole Koon, 21, even though there is no evidence their vehicles collided. Police have alleged that Gardner tapped on his brakes twice while his truck was in front of Koon's vehicle, causing her to lose control of her Chevy Blazer. The indictment also accuses Gardner of blocking both lanes of travel while his vehicle was ahead of Koon's. A sheriff's detective previously testified that a passenger in Koon's vehicle who survived the wreck remembered that Koon was frightened when Gardner's truck sped up to catch them after Koon allegedly cut Gardner's truck off. Gardner didn't stop at the scene after Koon's vehicle wrecked, but he later passed by it and eventually turned himself in to the Fayette County Sheriff's Department, police said. Gardner has been free on a $66,000 bond since June 5. The conditions of the bond forbid Gardner from operating a motor vehicle, and he was required to enter a drug treatment program and submit to random drug testing with results forwarded to the district attorney's office.
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