Four large drinks indeed. That’s what State Dept. of Health attorney/blogger/former prosecutor/GOP activist Terry Record told police he had to drink before he ran a red light and cut Jimmy Cash’s truck in two. According to police, he had “at least 14 beers and six shots” in the 3.5 hours he was at Brad’s Brass Flamingo before getting into his car. Blood test results were between 0.15 and 0.17. His car was allegedly going 60 mph in a 35 mph zone.
Record was fired from his job with the Marion County Prosecutor’s Office but not charged after he lied about a hit and run accident involving a parked car in Broad Ripple in November. In December, he went to work with the Indiana State Department of Health but apparently did not disclose his brief stint with the prosecutor’s office.
According to his attorney, David E. Lewis, Record is “devastated for the victim’s family and for himself.”
You know, a .15 BAC strikes me as rather low for 14 beers and 6 shots in 3.5 hours. I don’t know how alcohol translates to BAC necessarily, but back in my college days, I engaged in some binge drinking from time to time. About once a year, my roommates and I would attempt to drink a case of beer. (The ill-advised “case chase”). One of my roommates drank a 6-pack in 11 minutes and came up about an ounce shy of drinking a 12 pack in an hour. So, I know whereof I speak. I can’t fathom the concerted effort it must take to drink 14 beers and 6 shots within the course of 210 minutes, presumably while also devoting attention to friends and strippers. (And drinking at a strip club isn’t cheap, by the way). All of this on a Sunday evening. Presumably with work scheduled for the next morning.
I don’t doubt that he was drunk and ran a red light and is completely liable for killing a man. But, unless he was a raging alcoholic, the specifics of his consumption don’t seem entirely credible to me. But, maybe my college drinking buddies and I were just lightweights.
Update The Indy Star is reporting that the judge has cut Record’s bail from $100,000 to $10,000. I think I just heard the explosion of the collective heads of the people who frequent the Indy Star’s comment threads.
Having witnessed some of the ill-advised “case chases”, I can confirm that we were lightweights Doug. If you use the simple BAC math of one beer equalling around 0.015 and one shot equaling 0.02 and factoring in the body can digest about two drinks an hour into your blood stream, it leaves you with a BAC around 0.23 or so. I agree with you that this number seems high. Most people wouldn’t have been able to find their car in the parking lot with a 0.23 let alone drive it, albeit recklessly.
It depends on how habituated the person is to alcohol. I recently had a patient who I would have guessed was at 0.20 or so due to moderately slurred speech, and she was really over 0.4. She was a daily drinker. If she weren’t, her alcohol level would have been potentially fatal. Instead, she was quite conscious (and really annoying).
Judging from his fatter face in the mug shot, and his recent more erratic driving, I would bet his drinking had become a pretty regular thing in the last six months or so. So he probably could find his car alright after such an alcohol load, but just not drive it very well.
There was a time when I could drink a fifth of Beam and still walk, albeit not well. Now after three or four drinks, I’m done for the night (and never drive, even after one). I’m just not habituated to alcohol anymore. A couple of months back I was enjoying a few beers out in Colorado over dinner after a day of skiing. After five drinks, I had to really focus to not stumble in a room full of strangers on the way to the bathroom. It wasn’t a very appealing feeling, and I’m sure the altitude and fatigue didn’t help. But thanks to my decreased tolerance, my bar tab is much less than it used to be.
Another variable is when the blood was drawn. He probably crashed 30-60 minutes after the last drink. Might have been at the scene and in the cruiser an hour. Then in the cell for an hour awaiting the court order for the blood draw. Or was he at a hospital? Anyway, he might have metabolized 4-6 drinks before he was tested, maybe more.
But, jeeze, drinking 1.3 gallons of beer plus 6 shots in 210 minutes seems like an awful lot of fluid to consume. Seems like, back in the day, that amount of alcohol would’ve taken me more like 6 hours — and that’s in a bar with nothing else going on other than drinking.
He was drinking pitchers of beer in a strip club. It depends on what they’re calling a beer. Usually when you order them singly, you get it in a bottle or a large cup. But when a pitcher comes, they give you the smaller cups, don’t they? It’s been a while and I don’t remember. But if he was pouring himself 10 oz. drinks, that would knock a third of a gallon off right there. Then it’s ten oz. of beer every fifteen minutes. Enough to make you run to the bathroom a few times, but far from impossible. Volume-wise, the shots are an afterthought. Although that’s why shots get you in trouble.
And, of course, not all shots are created equally. I think they mentioned cherry vodka in there. But, who knows if there was a buttery nipple or other foo foo shots mixed in there.
Good Lord. You mean somebody over the age of 18 drinks cherry vodka?
Anyway, it’s possible that the reported BAL is from blood work at the hospital, meaning he might have had a hour or so to sober up first. Or that those pitchers are being over counted. At any rate, somebody at Brad’s F.U.’d big time, and should be facing charges. It’s illegal to serve an intoxicated person, let alone one you permitted to get intoxicated on your premises in the first place.
It’s a perfect example of why bars should refuse to sell beer by the pitcher. At minimum the man walked out of there with a BAL twice the legal limit, got into his car and drove away. It’s unconscionable. If the stories are true one hopes Mr. Cash’s family winds up owning the place.
I’d also be sweating if I was drinking with this guy. Maybe no direct liability, but certainly a lot of potential discomfort.
I just wanna know why the guy had his bail cut.
Why was he NOT charged after the earlier incident?
Is the GOP in IN totally corrupt or what?
The bail cut sounded pretty straight forward. There is a bail matrix put out by (I think) the county judges. Crime A has a recommended bail of $x. Driving while intoxicated causing injury apparently carries a presumptive bail amount of $5,000. The judge here decided to double it. I don’t think there was anything nefarious — other than possibly the judges set the presumptive bail too low in the first place. But, consider, due to the presumption of innocence, bail is really supposed to be a matter of ensuring that the accused appears for court, not an actual penalty.
As for prior charges not getting filed, there could be some good-old-boyism at work. But, it could also just have been evidence that’s shakier than it appears to be from newspaper reports. Just a possibility. I have no idea.
Don’t forget that weight is a big factor in BAC. All the BAC charts include weight and time in hours. A 120 pound person can hit.08 fast whereas a 220 pound person can drink much more before hitting .08. At .15 you can be pretty wasted, yet that was the limit used by most states when I was in college.