Wednesday, November 25, 2015

DUI Dishonor Roll

Kaitlyn Vahey, age 19, stands before Judge William O'Grady

As usual I'll let the public court documents speak for themselves but would again point out that a rear end collision caused by driving with a blood alcohol concentration almost twice that of the legal limit, on Main Street at 4:12 PM, in the busy college town of Amherst, could easily have resulted in the death of a pedestrian or cyclist.

Click to enlarge/read
Patrick Homyak, age 26, arraigned before Judge O'Grady

Interestingly enough, a police Statement of Facts cuts both ways.

Safe bet Leandro Celadilla's attorney will point out the BAC showed .06 which is a tad under the legal limit of .08. But the Commonwealth does not exclusively rely on the Breath Test results, although one over the limit pretty much makes prosecution a slam dunk.

 Mr. Celadilla was in lock up so no photo available

And since Mr. Celadilla was also charged in the same incident with domestic abuse (but that Court document is impounded) the state will still have plenty to bargain with when his case comes up for pre trial next month.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

5.3/10

Would not bang,

Anonymous said...

Happy Thanksgiving to Larry, Ed, and CANs everywhere.

Anonymous said...

First of all, the point of administrating the breathalyzer is to determine if someone is intoxicated over the minimum threshold to be considered drunk. Patrick Homyack quite clearly was not. To call .06 "a tad under" .08 is simply to wish for a result for a result that was not found. It doesn't take a math major to figure out that .6 is only 75% of .8, so it's not exactly a smidge under it. Otherwise, every student that gets a C grade should tell their parents they almost got an A. He also wasn't driving erratically. He was just pulled over for having a burned out headlight. I'm all for throwing the book at drunk drivers, but not everyone that has a beer is drunk. This one will get thrown out except for his paying a fine for having a burned out headlight. The fact that the officer smelled alcohol is just wish fulfillment as no open container was found in the vehicle, and it's just subjective testimony that was not supported by the breathalyzer.

Anonymous said...

Larry,

I am thankful today for the countless, thankless hours spent by volunteers serving on our town boards and committees, hours, at home and in meetings, spent being vigilant about the well-being of all of us who live here. I know this work involves some hard thinking. I believe that we are blessed by these people in numbers and in their depth of commitment far greater than other communities. May it always be so, but, in the meantime, let's not take these tremendous gifts for granted.

Rich Morse

Anonymous said...

oh my god, Mr. Morse if you ever tried to get something done at the Town Hall,
it is forever! Don't take my word try it yourself.

Forever, forever and ever.

Anonymous said...

Double the legal limit? She's going to walking from now on.

Larry Kelley said...

Almost double.

Since this is her first offense she will probably take a 24D disposition, and will only lose her license for 45 days.

Anonymous said...

Nor would she you.

Anonymous said...

Would not bang? Not bang whom? The woman or the man? Amherst celebrates diversity. And crassness.