Winslow woman killed in crash after leaving Windsor Fair remembered as good mother

Jennifer Hood was excited Sunday when she left her Winslow home and headed to the annual Windsor Fair.

“She was going to go with a friend,” Lisa Hood, Jennifer’s mother, said Tuesday. “She was really happy about bringing the kids to the fair.”

Jennifer Hood Photo courtesy of Lisa Hood

But the friend was sick and ended up having to go to the hospital, Lisa Hood said.

Later that day, Jennifer Hood and Seth LaBreck would be killed when the pickup truck LaBreck was driving veered off Route 32 at about 9:45 p.m. Sunday and struck a utility pole, then rolling over and stopping on its roof.

The Maine State Police said Monday that LaBreck, 35, of South China, had been drinking alcohol and was speeding. He was not wearing a seat belt and was thrown from the truck.

Hood, 38, who was wearing a seat belt, died at the scene.

Lisa Hood said the couple’s two children had apparently been dropped off at the home of LaBreck’s mother before the crash and the couple may have been on their way to pick them up.

Hood said she has heard from people who saw the crash that the pickup truck went airborne before it struck the pole.

Lisa Hood said her daughter, who had two older children who live with their father, graduated from Winslow High School in 2000. She had been working as a certified nursing assistant between having children.

“She just liked it,” Lisa Hood said. “That’s what I did when she was little, and she ended up getting into it. She liked taking care of the old people.”

Since then, Jennifer Hood and her two younger children had been staying with her grandmother at an apartment at Lisa Hood’s house. Jennifer Hood had had recently taken the test to renew her CNA certificate, and she was working on getting a job.

“She wanted to get an apartment and get out on her own,” Lisa Hood said.

Most of Jennifer Hood’s time was spent with her children, including enjoying the pool or taking them camping, which she loved.

“Jen had a big heart,” her mother said. “She’d do anything you asked her. She was very close to her family.”