Police: Driver Very Intoxicated In Fatal Cicero Crash
CICERO (STMW) -- A man with a blood-alcohol level more than three times the legal limit was driving more than 75 mph when he crashed last month in Cicero -- killing one passenger and seriously injuring another.
Ismael Garcia, 33, was charged with reckless homicide, aggravated DUI causing death and aggravated DUI causing great bodily harm, Cicero spokesman Ray Hanania said Friday. Garcia had been hospitalized in intensive care since the crash.
Police said he had a blood-alcohol level of .255 -- more than three times the legal limit of 0.08 to drive -- and had cocaine in his system when he drove the 2009 Chevrolet Impala that crashed about 5:35 a.m. on Jan. 23 in the 1200 block of Laramie Avenue in Cicero.
The car caught fire and responding police were unable to remove the three occupants because the doors were smashed and could not be opened.
Investigators learned the car was traveling 78 mph just seconds before the crash, police documents said.
The Cicero Fire Department extinguished the fire and emergency personnel found Bianca Christakis-Prieto dead in the front passenger's seat, according to police documents. She died of blunt force trauma to her spine being the crash, authorities said.
Garcia and a woman in the backseat were both unresponsive and paramedics took them to Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, according to police documents. The paramedic noted a smell of alcohol coming from Garcia after the crash.
The backseat passenger suffered multiple spinal fractures that required rods and bone fusions; broken ribs, blood in her lungs, severe lung contusions, a broken left knee and a fractured clavicle, according to police documents.
The backseat passenger told investigators Garcia picked the women up at Christakis-Prieto's home about 11:30 p.m. on Jan. 22, according to police documents. The three passed a bottle of vodka mixed with juice around the car as they drove to a Chicago beach, where Garcia drove onto a grassy area and began "doing doughnuts in the grass at a high rate of speed."
Investigators also found a nearly empty bottle of Jagermeister and an empty bottle of Jose Cuervo tequila in the car, according to police documents.
Later, Chistakis-Prieto posted on her Facebook account "CRUSIN DOWNTOWN DRINKIN THIS HENNY BOTTLE" and "IF YU CNT HANDLE YUR LIQ THEN DNT DRINK BITCH, ON MY THIRD BOTTLE STILL OUT HERE."
The backseat passenger later told police she asked Garcia to take her home, but he said he would only do so after he "finished this second bottle."
While police were investigating the crash, a woman stuck in traffic went into labor and delivered a son in the backseat of a car.
(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2013. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
