Report: Teens were drunk

New Haven (WTNH) - Two teenagers killed when their car was struck by a police cruiser in Orange had blood alcohol levels over the legal limit, the New Haven Register reported Thursday.

The Register quotes anonymous sources saying the two teenagers were legally drunk at the time of the crash.

Lawyers for those teens are quick to point out this does not let Officer Jason Anderson off the hook. He was travelling 94 miles an hour on Route 1 in Orange last June.

The two 19-year-olds, David Servin and Ashlie Krakowski, were in a car that turned left in front of the cruiser. The impact was caught on the dashboard camera of another speeding police car.

The Register quotes sources saying the teens both had blood alcohol levels around 0.13. That's about one and a-half times the legal limit of 0.08. However, because Servin and Krakowski were underage, the legal driving limit for them was only 0.02.

A source close to officer Anderson says the alcohol impaired David Servin's judgement as he made that left turn.

A lawyer for the family of Ashlie Krakowski says no matter what, there's no way the teens could have known the car coming at them was going more than 90 miles an hour.

Both of the victim's families are bringing civil charges against Officer Anderson in addition to the criminal case.

According to Quinnipiac University law professor Jeffrey Meyer, said "technically as a legal matter, it probably isn't going to win the day for the defense because it still doesn't relieve the officer from the obligation to drive safely,"

Meyer said this is a significant development in the controversial case, which he is currently using as a teaching tool in his Criminal Procedure class.

Meyer's students "go right from newspaper accounts on the Internet right into PowerPoint slides that go in front of my students and we talk about the real-life consequences," he said.

Meyer explains to his attorneys-in-training that for a manslaughter conviction the state will have to prove extreme recklessness on the part of Officer Anderson. In Meyer's legal opinion, the excessive speed of 94 miles an hour meets that standard.

What the teens were doing is called contributory negligence, he said. They were drinking, they turned left on a red blinking light, but Meyer said in civil law that does not cancel out the recklessness charge. For a criminal case it's up to the jury.

"The officer is still going to be faced with substantial evidence of having driven very recklessly," Meyer said.

Anderson is scheduled to be back in court on January 13th.

The Milford Police Commissioners are expected to review his employment status with the department on Monday.