BOSTON -- The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority driver accused of causing a Green Line trolley crash pleaded not guilty after he admitted that he was texting his girlfriend during the moments leading up to the crash.

Aiden Quinn, 24, told officials that he was texting just before his trolley collided with another near Government Center on May 8.

Quinn was driving an outbound train when he proceeded to drive through two green lights, a yellow light and a brake light before he collided with another Green Line train, prosecutor Paul Treseler said during his arraignment Monday. The force of the impact knocked the stationary trolley 36 feet along the track at speeds as high as 9 mph, Treseler said.

"Mr. Quinn admitted to police that he had been texting his girlfriend and did not see one of the green lights, the yellow light or the red light," Treseler said.

During the course of the investigation, officials said Quinn's cell phone showed that he was in the process of writing a text message at the time of the crash and that the message was never sent.

He was charged with gross negligence. More than 60 people were injured when his trolley rear-ended another train.

"Putting this man in state prison is not going to help anybody. It is not going to fix any of the injuries done to him or anybody else," Quinn's attorney, James Sultan, said.

Quinn's attorney said the state picked the wrong statue to charge his client and that gross negligence by a person in control of a train is rarely, if ever, used in the Bay State.

"They've chosen to charge him under a statue that is 135 years old," Sultan said.

At least seven of the passengers are still coping with very serious injuries. Among them is a 28-year-old Lynn woman who suffered a broken pelvis, a 19-year-old Salem woman who suffered a concussion and fractured vertebrae, a 35-year-old Charlestown woman who had her shoulder separated from her collarbone, a 39-year-old man from New Hampshire who suffered a 6-inch gash to his head, and a 32-year-old pregnant Brookline woman who suffered a broken tailbone.

"It's been aggravating and annoying living like this. I lost my summer, and I am going to be set back in school at least a year," crash victim Samantha Mattei said.

The MBTA fired him one week after the crash. If convicted, Quinn could face up to three years in prison.

Treseler did not request that Quinn be held on bail. Instead, he asked the court to order Quinn to report weekly to the Department of Probation.