BENNINGTON — The driver in a head-on collision in Manchester over five years ago that crossed over the center line, resulting in serious injuries to both drivers, was found not guilty of felony gross negligence, but convicted on a lesser charge at a jury trial Wednesday in Bennington.

It took a jury of seven women and five men less than an hour to acquit Derek Bushee, now 43, in the June 2020 crash that seriously injured Bushee and the other driver along a curving, narrow road in Manchester. Once the jury made its decision, it was required by Vermont law to consider a lesser charge of negligence with injury, a less serious misdemeanor charge carrying a lighter penalty. The jury found Bushee guilty on the lesser charge.

Bushee, who was being held at the time of the trial, was then release

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