A 22-year-old man with more than twice the legal limit for alcohol in his blood drove his car off the road near Darien High School, tore up 50 feet of grass, hit and snapped a utility pole and caused his car to roll over, Darien police said.
The man was taken to Stamford Hospital with numerous minor injuries on the night of the accident, Monday, April 4. He was arrested June 6, two months after the incident, possibly because getting arrest warrants approved by state prosecutors and judges has become glacially slow after state budget cutbacks.
The delay may also have resulted from police needing to execute a search warrant (signed by a judge on April 27) for the hospital to turn over blood test information, which showed his blood-alcohol content was 0.18, over twice the 0.08 legal limit, according to police.
Darien police described the incident with this account (which includes accusations not proven in court):
Police were called to High School Lane at 11:41 p..m. on the report of a motor vehicle accident, which occurred just past that street on the Darien High School campus, just off the circular drive that leads to parking lots.
Remi Rosa-Peralta of Bridgeport told police he had been driving in the northbound lanes of the Merritt Parkway, headed toward home in Bridgeport, when he somehow got off the highway and headed into Darien. He had been drinking at a party after work, he said.
When his car, a 2008 Acura TL, left the pavement, it hit a utility pole, snapping it off at the base. The pole didn’t fall to the ground, however — it was held up by the wires attaching it to other poles. Police contacted Eversource, which sent a crew to fix it.
After hitting the pole, the car rolled over, landing on some shrubs. It was severely damaged. Rosa-Peralta told police he thought his speed was about 30 mph at the time.
Since Rosa-Peralta was going to the hospital to get his injuries examined, no field sobriety tests were done at the scene and he wasn’t taken to Darien Police Headquarters for a blood-alcohol test.
When an arrest warrant charging him with driving while under the influence was approved and Rosa-Peralta told about it, he turned himself in at Darien Police Headquarters on June 6. Despite the accident, he was not charged with any other violation of the law. He posted a $7,500 bond and was told to appear June 17 (Friday) in state Superior Court in Stamford.