Defense witness says Vellanoweth suffered brain injury in fatal wreck

Roberto P. Vellanoweth's trial pivoted into the defense side Monday, with his first witness testifying that the politically connected former parole official suffered "traumatic brain injury" in last year's car wreck that killed four people.

Neuropsychologist Myla Young's testimony was designed to explain some of the bizarre statements Vellanoweth gave to authorities after the crash, one of which was that it was his wife who had been driving. She was out of state at the time.

Young testified that her analysis of the 64-year-old Vellanoweth showed that he sustained a "very specific pattern of impairment" as a result of the fatal wreck. Her conclusion, Young said, was that "Mr. Vellanoweth is an individual who experienced a traumatic brain injury."

Its "immediate consequences," Young said, "were strange, unpredictable, uncharacteristic behavior" that has since developed into what she called "post-concussion syndrome."

Vellanoweth has been charged with gross vehicular manslaughter and other offenses in the March 26, 2007, deaths of Brizchelle Rice-Nash, 21; her 19-month-old son, Kamall Osby; her sister, Brittanya Rice-Nash, 17; and Shanice Patrice Carter, 18, a family friend.

Authorities said he was drunk at the time of the crash and a forced blood draw from him afterward turned up an alcohol reading of 0.16 percent, exactly twice the legal limit.

Prosecutors rested their case Monday after calling another police officer to testify and by having a transcript of their final witness's testimony read into the record.

Sacramento Police Officer Shannon Whent said she pulled up to the site of the South Land Park Drive crash and administered a field sobriety test to Vellanoweth. She testified that she smelled alcohol on him and that his eyes were "bloodshot."

According to Whent, Vellanoweth failed to follow her instructions when she ran him through the first test, turning his head and moving his arms and feet when she asked him to keep his body still and follow a pencil's path with his eyeballs.

She said he refused to take another test to stand on one foot and count to 30.

"He told me, 'I'm not going to do that,' " Whent testified.

At the hospital, she said, Vellanoweth tried to explain what happened in the moments before the crash.

"He said, 'You know, my foot slipped off the brake, and I hit the gas,' " Whent testified. " 'It must have been a helluva impact. Take me to jail.' "

The prosecution's final witness, Bosch Auto Parts quality engineer John Wallinson, whose company manufactured the components that activated the air bags of Vellanoweth's Jeep Grand Cherokee, put his speed at 72 mph at the time of the fatal collision, according to the transcript that was read into the record.

Wallinson's analysis showed that the gas pedal of Vellanoweth's Jeep had been depressed up until a mere half-second before the air bags deployed, according to the transcript.

Young, the Walnut Creek neuropsychologist who opened the defense testimony, based her diagnosis of a brain injury on her interviews with Vellanoweth and his family and friends, on his childhood, work and psychiatric history and on records of the crash.

She said that individuals who suffer brain injuries of the sort she attributed to Vellanoweth can be "aggressive" or "apathetic" in the moments and months after the trauma.

"Irritability, irrational behavior, all sorts of things happen at the moment of acute trauma," she said.

Tests performed since the crash, Young said, showed Vellanoweth's intellectual functioning as only average, despite his advanced, post-graduate education. She said his language usage was "intact," but that his numerical performance registered at the seventh-grade level.

Vellanoweth's wife told Young that he now has problems doing the math right to balance his checkbook, Young testified. His attention, concentration, memory and learning also are impaired, she said.

The trial resumes today in Sacramento Superior Court.

About the writer:

• Call Andy Furillo, (916) 321-1141.