DRISCOLL

PROVIDENCE — Frances P. Driscoll was scheduled to be on an operating table today, undergoing major reconstructive surgery on her shattered arm, instead of seated at the defendants’ table in federal court, watching a jury prepare to deliberate her fate.

In a strange and sobering twist to the long-running corruption case against Driscoll and Robert A. Urciuoli, a federal judge yesterday postponed closing arguments for the second straight day after Driscoll was seriously injured in a fall on the courthouse steps on Monday.

Driscoll, 69, was escorting her ailing husband, Donald, from the century-old Beaux Arts courthouse on Kennedy Plaza after court when she lost her balance and tumbled down the granite steps.

She lay writhing in pain, her left arm shattered in a dozen places from her shoulder to her elbow, and her face smashed up by the stone. Paramedics responded to the scene and rushed her to the emergency room at Rhode Island Hospital, where she underwent tests for cranial bleeding, according to her daughter, Deirdre Driscoll.

Those tests proved negative, but her upper left arm was so badly broken that it will require major reconstructive surgery, scheduled for noon today.

A short time before her fall, the defense had rested in the two-plus-week trial. It was about noon. Chief U.S. District Judge Mary M. Lisi had sent the jury home early, telling them to return at 9 a.m. yesterday prepared to listen to closing arguments.

While doctors worked on Driscoll at Rhode Island Hospital, lawyers for the prosecution and the defense huddled with the judge and discussed what to do. There would be questions in these circumstances about what to tell the jury, and what impressions, positive or negative, her absence or her injuries could leave that might unduly influence the verdict.

While Driscoll has the legal right to waive her appearance in court for closing arguments, there was also concern about whether she was able to make a clear-headed decision. Although she was conscious and alert yesterday, her daughter said that she was also heavily sedated because of the pain.

This setback is the latest turn in a winding road that began four years ago, with a federal corruption probe of former state Sen. John A. Celona’s ties to health-care concerns, including Roger Williams Medical Center.

Celona eventually pleaded guilty to selling his office, including to Roger Williams for a $700-a-week consulting job. Urciuoli and Driscoll were charged with stealing his honest services by hiring him to do the hospital’s political bidding at the State House. The defendants counter that Celona was hired to perform legitimate work promoting the hospital’s services to the elderly.

Driscoll, the hospital’s former vice president for public relations and development, who had opposed Celona’s hiring, was convicted by a jury along with Urciuoli two years ago, based on a paper trail of faxes and memos between Celona and the defendants. But their conviction, which raised the prospect of Driscoll having to go to prison, was overturned by a federal appeals court in Boston early this year, leading to this second trial.

Driscoll has spoken during the trial of her eagerness for “justice” this time around, her daughter said. Her family — husband Donald and children Deirdre and Donald — have been by her side throughout both trials. Driscoll and her husband have other health issues, and she is his primary caregiver.

Now, though, her fate is even more uncertain.

“She wants to pursue justice and finish what she started, but I’m not sure her surgeons will allow it,” said Deirdre Driscoll. “She wants to be in court, but she’s in rough shape.”

After the accident, Judge Lisi decided late Monday afternoon to postpone closing arguments until today. Then, late yesterday afternoon, after a chambers conference with the lawyers, the judge decided to postpone closing arguments again, this time without announcing a new date.

Instead, the judge called the jury to be in court today at 9 a.m., to receive instructions about what will happen next. A court clerk did not elaborate on what the judge will say. Lawyers for both sides declined to comment.

Deirdre Driscoll said that doctors had to order implants from New York for the reconstructive surgery, which they considered imperative to perform quickly to avoid lasting nerve damage. Following the surgery, Driscoll faces a three- to four-month recovery, her daughter said.

“I don’t want anybody to think that she’s at home with a tummy ache,” said Deirdre Driscoll of her mother’s absence from the courtroom. “She so wants to be there.”

mstanton@projo.com