Man charged in crash that killed sister of retired Supreme Court justice

(Reuters) – An Arizona man has been charged with manslaughter and driving under the influence after a collision that killed Ann Day, a former state senator and sister of retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, authorities said on Sunday.

Jarrad Barnes, 24, of Tucson, was driving a vehicle that crossed the raised median of a highway in the desert city on Saturday and struck Day’s car head on, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos said in a statement. The 77-year-old woman was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital.

Barnes was booked at the Pima County Jail after being released from the hospital with non-life threatening injuries sustained in the accident, the statement said.

A spokesman for the sheriff’s department said the results of toxicology tests would be available in about two weeks.

Day, a Republican and a member of a pioneering family of ranchers, served as a state senator for 10 years and a Pima County supervisor for 12 years, according to local media.

Her older sister Sandra Day O’Connor was the first woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court, after her nomination by President Ronald Reagan in 1981. She retired in 2006.

(Reporting by Frank McGurty in New York, editing by G Crosse)