Mason To Serve 17 Years For Crash

The woman responsible for a 2011 crash that killed a Department of Social Services worker and a 10-year-old-girl will spend at least 23 years in jail, according to 13th Circuit Solicitor Walt Wilkins III

Last month, Julie Melton Mason, 46, of Marietta, pleaded guilty to two counts of felony DUI resulting in death and two counts of felony DUI involving great bodily injury.

She was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Wilkins spoke of the sentence during a recent Pickens County Taxpayers Association meeting.

“She do 85 percent,” Wilkins said.

The crash occurred in Pickens on March 4, 2011 and left DSS worker Chrystal Nicole Harrison, 36, and Raven Alania Stancell, 10, dead.

Two of Stancell's brothers were injured in the crash. The siblings were in DSS protective custody.

Wilkins said Mason had been “huffing keyboard cleaner” before her car crossed the center line, striking Harrison's state-owned vehicle.

Both Harrison and Stancell were pronounced dead at the scene. Stancell's brothers each suffered broken legs.

After being released on $80,000 bond, Mason failed to show up for a court appearance in April.

She was later caught in Ohio and returned to South Carolina.

Wilkins said his office was happy with the sentence.

“It's a very strong sentence,” he said.

He said his office is moving “a tremendous amount of DUI cases,” addressing the backlog of cases.

“When we started, we had over 350 DUI cases,” he said. “We're down to less than a hundred now. We had some of them getting two, three, four years old. Now all DUI cases are typically less than one year before they're resolved, which may not sound good, but when you compare us to the rest of the state, it's really good. If I could make them in six months, if I could make them in three months, I would.”