WOODLAND — A Davis man accused of fleeing the scene of a head-on crash with a motorcyclist will be back in court in late May to determine whether the case will proceed to trial or settle with a plea agreement.
Brian Douglas Cassidy, 59, has been ordered to stand trial on drunken driving, hit-and-run causing injury and other charges in connection with the Dec. 17, 2014, nighttime collision on Chiles Road that left the motorcyclist, Davis resident Nikolas Kostelny, with a compound fracture to his right arm.
Cassidy pleaded not guilty at an arraignment hearing Friday, with visiting Judge Stephen Mock setting a May 27 court date for trial-setting or an early disposition conference.
Kostelny, 22, testified at Cassidy’s April 9 preliminary hearing that he had been riding his motorcycle eastbound on Chiles Road when a westbound Jeep Patriot, allegedly driven by Cassidy, suddenly swerved into his lane and struck him head-on.
With two bones protruding from his arm and his hand hanging by tendons, Kostelny repeatedly asked the driver to call 911 but he refused. Eventually, he said, Cassidy drove away, forcing Kostelny to walk to a nearby hotel in search of help.
In court, Kostelny recalled he could smell a strong odor of alcohol as he spoke to Cassidy through the driver’s-side window. Asked by prosecuting attorney Matt DeMoura how he knew, Kostelny said his mother taught him from an early age how to detect the signs of intoxication.
“My father struggled with alcoholism. … I saw him go in and out of jail, and I got very good at reading when someone has had a few to drink,” Kostelny said. Slurred words, glassy eyes, belabored speech, “these are the traits I was noticing at the time of the accident.”
The Cassidy case is a somewhat unusual one, in which a DUI charge has been based on the victim’s observations as opposed to those of a trained law-enforcement officer, or the results of a blood or Breathalyzer test.
DeMoura said the law allows for prosecutors to base the charge on a layperson’s own personal experiences.
“Obviously, we’d like to have the chemical test, but a lot of times with the hit-and-runs, they’re running because they’re drunk,” he recently told The Enterprise.
In Cassidy’s case, authorities didn’t locate his damaged vehicle for 12 days, and the resulting investigation took another two weeks before Davis police obtained a warrant for Cassidy’s arrest. He was taken into custody on Jan. 29 at his Rancho Yolo home.
Cassidy blamed his daughter and her boyfriend for the wrecked state of his sport-utility vehicle, and claimed he had been with his estranged wife on the night of the crash, according to the arrest-warrant affidavit.
His defense attorney, Kellen Cooper, fought the DUI charge at the preliminary hearing, saying the evidence of Cassidy’s intoxication was “totally lacking.” It’s equally plausible, Cooper added, that his client fell asleep at the wheel prior to the 11 p.m. crash.
“I think when a witness comes up here and makes statements based on speculation and conjecture … to me that’s insufficient in the court of law,” Cooper said.
Judge Samuel McAdam disagreed, ruling there was sufficient evidence for the charge to stand based not only upon Kostelny’s observations but also Cassidy’s erratic driving prior to the crash and his decision to allegedly flee the scene.
In addition to the felony DUI and hit and run charges, Cassidy faces an enhancement for inflicting great bodily injury and a misdemeanor count of driving with a suspended license. He remains in Yolo County Jail custody.
— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene