Jury sees drunken driver's field sobriety test
Other driver also describes seconds before fatal crash
Jury sees drunken driver's field sobriety test
The jury in the intoxication manslaughter trial of Jenny Ybarra on Monday saw the field sobriety test she was given at the scene of a fatal wrong way crash in December 2007 on Loop 410 near Rigsby.
James Reeves, then an SAPD officer and now an attorney, testified that when he asked Ybarra what happened the night of the accident, she said, “I saw a car coming crazy and they hit me.”
In fact, police said Ybarra’s grey Pontiac had slammed into a black Honda with three young women, injuring its front seat passenger, Erica Smith. Smith died the next day.
The SAPD dash cam video shows Ybarra at first telling the officer she didn’t know how much alcohol she’d consumed, before saying she’d had two beers and two shots at a bar and at a friend’s house.
The jury has been told Ybarra’s blood alcohol content was 0.13, nearly twice the legal limit.
Reeves said Ybarra never asked about the occupants of the other vehicle.
Later, every seat in 487th District Court was filled as Sabrina Shaner, the driver of the black Honda, took the stand, describing the seconds before and after the crash.
“I knocked out. I just know there was a flash and the next thing I remember was standing outside and looking in the passenger side window,” Shaner said.
Inside on the front passenger seat, her friend was dying from a massive head wound.
As part of her testimony, the jury also heard Shaner’s 911 call as the dispatcher asked if Smith was awake.
“No, she’s not,” Shaner said.
Shaner, who sobbed much of the time on the stand listening to the 911 call, also was later convicted of driving drunk that night. She said her blood alcohol content was 0.11. Shaner said she successfully fulfilled the six months probation she was given.
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