Attorney contends his client was not drunk when he drove car into nursing student who had stopped to help motorist.
By LARRY WELBORN
The Orange County Register
SANTA ANA – The defense attorney for a Santa Ana man accused of vehicular-manslaughter for a freeway crash that killed a good Samaritan argued Wednesday that his client was not drunk at the time of the tragedy and therefore his $1 million bail should be reduced.
A test revealed that Takayuki Saito, 41, had a .04 blood-alcohol level an hour after he crashed his Toyota 4-runner into a BMW on the I-5 freeway earlier this month, sending it careening into Kaydee Campbell, a 20-year-old nursing student who had stopped to render aid to another motorist, said defense attorney Ronald L. Cormack.
The collision near the Red Hills off-ramp was a “tragic accident,” Cormack told Superior Court Commissioner Cheryl L. Leininger. But Saito’s blood-alcohol level – which was lower than the 0.08 legal limit – shows “a presumption under the law that alcohol was not a factor,” Cormack argued.
But Leininger kept Saito’s bail at $1 million after Deputy District Attorney Susan Price argued she believed Saito was still impaired behind the wheel because of alcohol consumption.
Price also contended that Saito would be a flight risk if allowed free on bail. She said witnesses reported that he got back in his car after he saw Campbell’s body lying on the freeway and tried to drive away, and that he made a comment about returning to his native Japan if he were to be released on bail.
The prosecutor filed a new criminal complaint Wednesday, charging Saito with vehicular manslaughter with negligence while intoxicated, reducing the severity of the charge from gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated.
Saito, a chef, now faces a maximum sentence of seven years, eight months if convicted. His arraignment is scheduled for Jan. 14.
Craig and Doreen Campbell, Kaydee’s parents, sat holding hands in the courtroom gallery during the brief hearing on Wednesday. They breathed a sigh of relief when Leininger kept Saito in custody on $1 million bail.
They said outside court that they have already forgiven Saito.
“But I don’t want anyone to confuse our forgiveness with the fact that he needs to be punished for what he did,” said Doreen Campbell, a nurse. “We don’t want any other family to suffer what we are suffering.”
Craig Campbell, a captain with the Orange County Fire Authority, said, “it helps us get this through this is the knowledge that our baby gave her life while stopping to help someone else.”
Kaydee Campbell was a passenger in her boyfriend’s BMW car on Dec. 14 when they came upon a crash on the northbound lanes of the I-5 near Red Hill Avenue between a Honda and Lexus.
She was giving medical assistance to Evelyn Silva, 16, of Tustin, when Saito drove onto the scene in his 1992 black Toyota 4-Runner at about 65 mph, according to the California Highway Patrol.
Saito crashed into the BMW, sending it into Campbell and Silva. Campbell was pronounced dead at the scene. Silva was seriously injured and was rushed to Western Medical Center in Santa Ana to be treated for major injuries.
Craig and Doreen Campbell said they have visited with Silva in the hospital, where they hugged and cried with her father.
The Campbells also said that their three other children, son Cody, 23, and daughter Taylor, 19, and Allee, 17, took bunches of sympathy flowers friends and relatives had given the Campbell family to a nearby nursing home.
“I don’t know what to say now when people ask me how many children I have,” a teary-eyed Doreen Campbell said. “Do I say I have three children and an angel?”
Contact the writer: lwelborn@ocregister.com or 714 834-3784