In April of 2008, a Sauk County jury found O’Donnell, 25, of Prairie du Sac, guilty on two counts of homicide by intoxicated use of a vehicle in the deaths of Baraboo resident Ron Hart, 45 and Tanner Zimmerman, 23, of North Freedom. The jurors also reached a guilty verdict on a charge of causing injury by intoxicated use of a vehicle to Jerry Sprecher of Baraboo, then 45.

The fatal accident took place on Highway 113 near Devil’s Lake State Park on the evening of April 17, 2007

O’Donnell is now serving a 14-year term in state prison.

In early October, Sauk County Circuit Court Judge James Evenson ruled against arguments O’Donnell should get a new trial made by attorney Byron Lichstein of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School. Lichstein works with law students on cases in which they believe someone has been unjustly convicted.

While arguing for a new trial at a June hearing, Lichstein said O’Donnell’s previous attorney, Eric Schulenburg of Madison, was ineffective in defending him. He said Schulenburg could have more effectively disputed a prosecution expert’s testimony O’Donnell was intoxicated at the time of the crashes. The trial attorney could also have made a stronger case against an analysis of the collisions provided by a Wisconsin State Patrol accident reconstruction expert, Lichstein argued.

After O’Donnell’s defense attorney completed some procedural requirements in recent weeks, O’Donnell’s trial record was sent to the appeals court Friday, according to Sauk County Court records. A three-judge panel is expected to consider Lichstein’s arguments in the case.