Bail set for driver accused of killing teen in S. Barrington
A Cook County judge granted prosecutors’ request and set bail at $100,000 for a Schaumburg man who authorities say was intoxicated when the car he was driving struck a 19-year-old man who had walked onto Barrington Road in South Barrington during the early morning hours of April 28.
Timothy Hughes, 26, of the 400 block of Woodcroft Court, stood silently with his head bowed during a hearing Thursday afternoon before Judge Thomas Fecarotta as Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney Maria McCarthy described the accident that claimed the life of Cole Deacon, a 2011 Palatine High School graduate who studied graphic design at Schaumburg’s Illinois Institute of Art.
The impact threw Deacon onto the hood of Hughes’ car, shattering the windshield, McCarthy said. Deacon landed on the ground and was transported to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, where he remained in a coma until his death on May 7, McCarthy said.
Hughes told officers he had consumed four beers in the previous four hours and that he had smoked cannabis about two hours before the crash, McCarthy said. He has been charged with aggravated driving under the influence resulting in a death, which carries a sentence of three to 14 years in prison and allows for probation only if the court finds extraordinary circumstances warrant it.
Authorities say other drivers witnessed the accident. One witness observed Hughes’ car strike the victim and saw Hughes exit from the driver’s side. Another observed Hughes run to some nearby bushes and return to the accident scene at Barrington Road near Terra Vita Drive in South Barrington, McCarthy said. Police officers searched the bushes and recovered a plastic bag containing 4.5 grams of cannabis, McCarthy said.
Hughes declined to take field sobriety tests and refused a preliminary breath test, said McCarthy. A forensic scientist who examined a blood sample taken several hours later estimated Hughes’ blood-alcohol level to have been between .068 and .092 at the time of the crash, McCarthy said.
Tests also revealed Deacon’s blood alcohol content was .206 and that he had marijuana in his system, McCarthy said.
Hughes, whose background includes 24 months of supervision for a 2007 DUI in DuPage County, next appears in court on July 5.
Ÿ Daily Herald staff writer Eric Peterson contributed to this report.