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Attorney Richard Elliott stands with John P. Allen, 52, in June during Allen’s sentencing in Sagadahoc County Superior Court in connection with the 2006 traffic death of Harold Weisbein Jr.

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The Hyundai sedan swerved erratically through highway traffic -- speeding up, slowing down, whizzing past other vehicles. Its herky-jerky maneuvers were alarming enough that a nearby motorist called 911 from her cell phone.

It was an overcast afternoon -- May 24, 2006 -- and John P. Allen, 51, of Bath was on the road even though his license was suspended for medical reasons. Earlier in the day, after a doctor's appointment in Portland, he had taken prescription methadone and Oxycodone.

Nonetheless, the former dockmaster got behind the wheel of the Hyundai and headed south through Yarmouth on Interstate 295.

Allen was traveling with a scanner and a list of radio channels used by police. Shortly after the 911 call was placed, he made an illegal U-turn on a highway crossover, according to court documents. He continued to swerve as he headed back north.

Near the highway's Topsham exit, the Hyundai came to an abrupt stop, even though nearby traffic continued to move.

When a truck driver honked his horn, Allen suddenly accelerated. The Hyundai plowed into a Nissan Pathfinder with so much force that the Pathfinder somersaulted.

The crash killed the Pathfinder's driver, Harold Weisbein Jr., a 44-year-old college instructor.

Allen was bleeding from his forehead when he staggered out of his car and asked a bystander, "What the hell did I hit?"

Weisbein's death fits a pattern.

In the past four years, 65 people have died in crashes involving suspended drivers in Maine. In most of these cases, the suspended driver had a history of serious driving violations, such as drunken driving or operating with a suspended license. Usually, the suspended driver also had been using drugs or alcohol shortly before the crash.

The collision that killed Weisbein happened in a matter of seconds, but like many other fatal crashes involving suspended drivers, it was years in the making.

In Florida, where John Allen worked as a dockmaster during the 1990s, his driving record shows two convictions for driving with a suspended license.

In Maine he had four previous license suspensions, three of them for repeated violations, and 10 speeding convictions over a 20-year period.

During a two-month stretch in 2005, Allen was involved in four motor-vehicle crashes.

Police reports show that he was at fault in at least two of the crashes, none of which resulted in injuries.

At the time of the fatal crash on I-295, Allen's license was suspended out of concern that he had sleep apnea, and a belief that the medical condition was causing him to fall asleep at the wheel, according to his lawyer, Richard Elliott II of Boothbay Harbor.

As it turned out, it wasn't sleep apnea that was causing Allen to become drowsy while driving, according to his lawyer. It was methadone.

Police records from the years before the fatal crash show that Allen was pulled over many times for erratic driving, often after concerned motorists called police. Officers regularly concluded that Allen was sober.

In one typical police report from July 2000, a Bath officer wrote: "Operator stopped in his driveway at 22 Webber Ave., subject was sober, just a bad driver, subject weaves and drives below the speed limit."

Allen, who is serving an eight-year sentence at the Maine State Prison, said in an interview that he began taking methadone in the early 1980s, and that it made him sleepy.

"There's just no doubt. You will end up getting drowsy and falling asleep," said Allen, who is now 53. "And that's just the nature of the medication."

Often, when authorities pulled Allen over for erratic driving, they concluded that he was simply a bad driver because he became alert when they approached his car, and because there is no way for officers to determine during a traffic stop whether a motorist has been using methadone, he said.

Allen, who pleaded guilty to manslaughter, among other charges, seemed...