Hingham Apple Store crash driver learns his fate. What we know

PLYMOUTH – The man charged with murder after his SUV slammed into the glass facade of the Apple Store in Hingham is returning home after a 40-day mental health evaluation, but not without first receiving a stern lecture from the judge who made the ruling.

Bradley Rein was at Plymouth Superior Court on Monday, Feb. 5, to learn whether his $100,000 bail would be reinstated after he failed to keep his GPS monitor charged for a second time.

Rein last appeared in Plymouth Superior Court on Dec. 27 after he was arrested again for allegedly not keeping his GPS monitor charged.

According to the district attorney's office, Rein allowed the monitor to lose power Friday, Dec. 22.

He was taken into custody for the same reason this past September. At that time, the state moved to revoke Rein’s bail and asked that he be held.

Judge Diane Freniere ordered Rein’s $100,000 bail revoked for 60 days. He was released around Thanksgiving, a prosecutor said.

Rein's attorney, Joan Fund, raised the issue of her client's mental health at the Dec. 27 hearing. The judge at that hearing ordered Rein to be held for an initial 20-day mental health commitment at a Department of Mental Health inpatient facility after an evaluation of Rein by court-designated forensic psychologist Karen Towers, who said he appeared disoriented and unemotional. He was held without bail during that time.

An initial mental health status review was scheduled for Jan. 16, but it was continued to Feb. 5 to allow the doctor evaluating Rein more time to finish the diagnosis and report the findings, according to the Plymouth County district attorney's office.

While prosecutors sought to maintain Rein's bail revocation Feb. 5, Fund said her client is now on medication to address what she said were the mental health issues that led to the psychiatric hold and evaluation in late December. She said he has family in the area who can offer him support.

She said that while the failure to keep his GPS charged is a serious violation of his conditions of release, she argued that it was the only reason he was brought back into court.

"There's no allegation of him driving. There's no allegation of him being out of state," she said. "He is here only for not keeping his GPS charged."

While Judge Elaine M. Buckley ruled in Rein's favor by rejecting prosecutors' bid to have his bail revoked, she let him know that this was his last chance to keep his GPS charged at all times.

"You do need to hear me very, very clearly," she said. "If that happens again, you will be revoked and you could go in for a lot longer period of time."

She ordered him to avoid alcohol, which she said "was a problem" for him, and submit to random urine tests to ensure he does so.

She told him to notify probation officials or his attorney if and as soon as he encounters problems with it in the future.

"More importantly, be an adult. Take care of that battery and make sure it's charged," she said. "It's not a hard thing to do. You charge your cellphone, so you can charge your GPS battery."

While Fund said Rein told her he had been diagnosed with a specific condition during the evaluation period, that was not listed in the evaluation report. Beyond that and the mention of medications, nothing further on the evaluation was discussed during the hearing.

Rein's next court appearance is scheduled for April 25 for a pretrial conference.

The Hingham Apple Store crash

Prosecutors say Rein was behind the wheel of his 2019 Toyota 4Runner when it crashed through the Apple Store's glass facade Nov. 21, 2022, reaching the back wall and trapping people inside.

Investigators said Rein was accelerating the SUV up to 60 mph in the five seconds before the crash and there was no indication of brake use during that time. Rein told police the crash was caused by his foot becoming stuck on the accelerator pedal.

The crash killed Kevin Bradley, 65, of Wayne, New Jersey, and injured more than a dozen others.

Rein told police he was at Derby Street Shops to repair a lens in his eyeglasses, which he was not wearing at the time of the crash. He was given an alcohol breath test at the police station that detected no alcohol in his blood.

Rein was indicted in March on a charge of second-degree murder, motor vehicle homicide by reckless driving, reckless driving, four counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and 18 counts of aggravated assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Bradley Rein, Apple crash driver, returns to court