New photos and maps from the New Jersey crash that killed NHL star Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew have surfaced in court filings, and lawyers for the accused drunken driver say the evidence could weaken the prosecution’s case.
The images, included in court papers filed on October 5, show the brothers’ mangled bicycles and the crushed front of driver Sean Higgins’ black SUV, along with schematics mapping out where the vehicle and the cyclists were when the collision happened.
The defense argues the schematics place the point of impact in a spot on the road that is different from what the police report described. “There is no physical evidence that defines precisely where the point of impact was,” a defense expert wrote in the new filings. Police have said the brothers were on the shoulder of the road, while Higgins’ team says they were riding in the roadway.
“However, the location of the physical evidence established that the cyclists were within the northbound travel lane (and not on the extremely narrow shoulder) immediately prior to impact,” the expert said, calling the assumption that they were on the narrow shoulder “bizarre and inconsistent with science and logic.”
Higgins’ lawyer is also arguing that the brothers were riding without required bike lights along a dark stretch of road. “Even when simply accepting the police analysis at face value, it is unclear how this analysis establishes that Mr. Higgins was responsible for the occurrence of the subject collision event,” the expert said.
One of the images showed a Trek road bike with its rear wheel missing and its front wheel bent in half, while another showed a Cervelo triathlon bike with a missing saddle and a bent rear wheel. Higgins’ Jeep Grand Cherokee was also badly damaged, with a cracked windshield and a crumpled front end.
Higgins, 45, an army veteran, is accused of driving with a blood alcohol level of .087, just above the .08 legal limit, when he struck the brothers as they cycled on the side of the road in Oldmans Township on August 29, 2024. The Gaudreau brothers, both fathers, were on their way back from their sister’s wedding rehearsal dinner when Higgins allegedly passed another car on the road and crashed into them.
The images surfaced as Higgins was due to appear in court on Monday afternoon. His lawyers included them in papers arguing that Salem County prosecutors should turn over certain evidence they used to reconstruct the crash, which the defense plans to challenge with its own expert analysis. Higgins is set to go on trial on January 5.
The New York Post first reported the new filings.
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