Man who killed Somers teacher faces loss of parole
On Thursday, a man who killed a beloved Somers teacher in an October 2006 drunken-driving crash denied he violated his parole by possessing drugs.
A hearing will be held Feb. 4 in Flathead District Court to determine whether or not Jason DeShazer, 32, will have to go back to prison.
DeShazer was picked up in Lake County on felony drug charges on Sept. 13, 2015. Drug possession would violate his terms of parole.
For killing Dawn Bowker in a brutal crash, DeShazer had been convicted in April 2007 of negligent homicide and was sentenced to 20 years in Montana State Prison with 10 years suspended.
Paroled after three and a half years, DeShazer went on to speak at several area schools, telling students about the poor choices that led to him taking a life.
DeShazer claimed the fatal crash had given him strength to avoid drugs and alcohol.
“The price of freedom is responsibility,” he told Columbia Falls and Bigfork high school students in 2013 during Red Ribbon Week.
During hearings to consider revoking his parole, Flathead District Judge Heidi Ulbricht is tasked with determining how well DeShazer managed that responsibility.
Lake County District Judge James A. Manley is presiding over the drug case.
According to court documents, DeShazer pulled into a turnout at 1:38 a.m. Sept. 13 on Montana 35, where a sheriff’s deputy was parked in a patrol car.
DeShazer allegedly had stopped because he thought the deputy might have hit the guard rail and needed help. DeShazer appeared intoxicated and a deputy searched the vehicle after learning that DeShazer had a prior conviction and did not have a valid driver’s license.
Drug paraphernalia and two baggies of suspected meth were found in the vehicle. A female passenger told the deputy that she and DeShazer had been using meth for three days. She and DeShazer showed the deputy track marks where they allegedly had been injecting drugs.
A trial is set for Feb. 16, according to Deputy Lake County Attorney James Lapotka. Lapotka has indicated that if DeShazer’s suspended sentence is revoked in Flathead County, it might be possible for him to receive a persistent felony offender designation and an enhanced sentence if he is convicted on the drug charges.
During his 2007 trial, Deshazer admitted drinking all night, using cocaine and smoking marijuana into the early morning hours before he climbed into his vehicle that later crossed the center line on Montana 82 between Somers and Bigfork.
His vehicle collided with Bowker’s. Bowker, 27, who was on her way to school, was killed. DeShazer suffered 52 broken bones in his face.
Reporter Megan Strickland can be reached at 758-4459 or mstrickland@dailyinterlake.com.