By Crescenzo Vellucci
Vanguard Sacramento Bureau Chief
SACRAMENTO – Sacramento County Assistant Public Defender Guy Danilowitz pulled the proverbial rabbit out of the hat here this week. He might deny that – his client was still convicted – but it could have been much, much worse.
It didn’t hurt that Daniel Haures, who took the stand in his own defense with not much to lose – he was charged with 12 counts, many of them felonies, including assault on peace officers with a deadly weapon, and faced more than a decade in prison – was a sympathetic defendant.
Until he testified, his fate appeared sealed. Almost every second of his crimes was caught on cameras from pursuing police vehicles and a helicopter.
And this week, the seven-men, five-women jury found Haures guilty of nine of the original counts – but not guilty on three of the most serious assault on a peace officer charges, all strikes,
Haures now faces sentencing May 1 on only one strike. His expected sentence could be as little four to six years, but not a 12 or more behind bars.
Danilowitz didn’t offer any witnesses and only cross-examined police officers after an intense high-speed police chase on April 18, 2019, in Sacramento county that involved speeds up to 100 miles per hour along Highway 50 from Rancho Cordova to Folsom to near CSU-Sacramento – part of it involved Haures driving the wrong way.
Not only did Danilowitz not call witnesses – hard to refute full color video – he informed jurors his client would not be contesting the majority of the charges, including the Driving Under the Influence (DUI) and resisting arrest counts. But he would be contesting the alleged assaults on officers.
“My client was extremely intoxicated, leading officers on a wild car chase. Police were doing their jobs. But there were no assaults,” the public defender told the jury.
Haures, a 43-year-old Romanian-born resident, was both a chilling and sympathetic witness on his own behalf. He could have, as the prosecution insisted, killed many people.
“Officer pulled gun. I run. Gun scared me. Fight or flight…I’m going to save my life and run,” said Haures in very halting English, describing how Rancho Cordova police confronted him in a Day’s Inn parking lot off Mather Field Road.
“I thought they were going to do something…violence, brutality,” Haures added. “I come from police behavior in Romania, working with military police. I was told to do violence. I carried out orders, wore mask…I don’t want to be broke,” Haures said, repeatedly twisting his hands while on the stand as if he were breaking something in half.
Danilowitz asked Haures if he broke people in Romania – he said he did, but quit and came to the U.S.
Haures said it was just not his Romanian experiences with police, but those with U.S. law enforcement, speaking – sometimes confusingly – about interactions with Sacramento area police, claiming he had been stopped numerous times for drinking and driving.
He said that he’d been in the U.S., and often drank a huge bottle of vodka daily. He admitted he drank heavily that day in Rancho Cordova. A criminologist said Haures’ blood alcohol was nearly five times the .08 legal limit, at .39.
“I drink all my life. Started drinking as kid,” Haures said, admitting he kept drinking in his nearly hour-long chase along Highway 50, almost finishing the bottle. The criminologist said he consumed the equivalent of 47 or more drinks.
“I thought I’d stop somewhere and surrender…didn’t want them to jump on me, break me. I had blackouts. I just trying to avoid everybody. Find quiet place to surrender,” he continued.
Sacramento County Deputy District Attorney Hilary Davisson told the jury in closing arguments, “What he did was reckless and dangerous with no regard for citizens…going home to their families and their kids.
“He fled peace officers. The defendant drove with willful and wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property,” said Davisson, who said Haures was guilty of assault with a deadly weapon on a police officer because he hit their cars repeatedly “on purpose…he never stopped driving in this dangerous manner.”
Danilowitz – who ceded guilt to the jury on the misdemeanors and lesser chargers, including resisting arrest and evading police – insisted that the vehicle was not used as a weapon by the defendant. And that he had not injured any of the officers even though he ran into several law enforcement vehicles.
Danilowitz likened the frantic and speedy chase as akin to “bumper cars,” not assault with a deadly weapon.
“Almost anything can potentially be a deadly weapon,” he said, dramatically taking a pen and holding it to his client’s throat. He then wadded up a piece of paper – that he had to comically unwad later because it was part of his closing statement – and said he could “shove” it down Haures throat and choke him.
“He did not use his car in such a way that is capable of causing death or great bodily injury,” he pointed out. “There were no injuries to any officers” although one officer said he felt a “nudge” when hit by the defendant.
“I get a redness on my shoulder when I carry a bag over my shoulder when I bike. The officers felt nothing, not a scratch,” the demonstrative public defender asserted to the jury, though admitting, “It was horrible, and scary. I don’t like what he did, but it wasn’t assault.”
Davisson, who ultimately lost the battle when jurors tossed out three of the four officer assault charges, strongly disagreed, describing the SUV driven by Haures as a “weapon, a one ton bullet. There’s no dispute that he was using a deadly weapon.”
Brian Bell, a Rancho Cordova Police officer now, but a Sacramento County Sheriff Deputy when the Haures chase took place, testified that he tried to cut off the defendant near Sacramento State because of students he knew were in the area.
“He ran into a power pole on Power Inn south of Folsom, and I tried to pinch him in when his vehicle was turned around facing my unit. He was driving a one ton missile,” said Bell, who said he didn’t feel “anything” when Haures his car, calling it a “nudge, nothing scary.”
Earlier, Allyson Avina, a criminologist with DA office with a University of California, Davis degree in genetics, went into great detail about how alcohol impairs drivers, dividing their “attention” and preventing intoxicated drivers from being able to focus on multi-tasking necessary to drive safely.
She testified that Haures’ .39 blood alcohol reading would have given him physical impairments, and should make a driver unsteady on his feet but “unsafe to operate a motor vehicle.”
Although, as the car chase video showed, not only could Haures stand, but he was either very lucky, or an accomplished race driver because other than crashes with law enforcement vehicles trying to ram him off the road, no civilian vehicles were damaged and no one was injured.
The first witness, Officer Garth Keffer, began the trial, testifying to have initiated the investigation after spotting Haures’ 2014 green Mitsubishi SUV in the Rancho Cordova Days Inn parking lot, citing his police training for the reason to expect suspicious activity.
“We believe it is suspicious to see individuals sit in their cars for a prolonged time in the motel parking lot,” he said, although he never said how long he noticed the car sitting there.
Approaching the car, Keffer said he saw a clear bottle that was only one-eighth full, and said he believed it to be alcohol of some kind. He later admitted to defense counsel he never saw Haures drink from the bottle.
Haures – who said he spent the night at the motel with his girlfriend – backed up and left the area with police vehicles in pursuit. Leaving the motel parking lot, Haures confidently drives through three lanes of traffic and over a slightly raised median to cross the street and evaded the unmarked police vehicles.
Haures continued onto Highway 50 in the video and the officers quickly lose sight – Keffer admits, “I might have lost visual at this point” (The speed limit on this stretch of highway is 65 mph according to Keffer, who later estimates that Haures was driving approximately 85-100 mph).
Keffer continues his testimony by saying that when Haures was apprehended “he appeared dazed and confused,” and that his “speech was slurred.” Keffer claimed that Haures was unable to do a field sobriety test, and three hours after the 5:08 pm pursuit began, a blood sample was finally drawn, recording a BAC (blood alcohol content) of .39 (roughly five times the legal limit).
Keffer said they were unable to draw a blood sample for such a long time because of Haures’ “medical condition at the time” and his “inability to cooperate,” failing to mention that officers tasered Haures multiple times and a police dog bit him, sending Haures to the hospital.
Continuing his evasion of the police on the highway, video showed Haures peeling off into a congested off ramp where he was essentially pinned by civilian and police vehicles due to the rush hour timing.
At this stage, there were four police cars attempting to apprehend Haures, who somehow escaped the box – at one point he was driving on the wrong side of the road.
Now, Haures’ SUV was visibly damaged, the bumper peeling off from the right-hand side. In a quick movement, Haures’ vehicle swerved out of control into an “AT&T box that is no longer,” according to testimony, bouncing off of the electrical unit, spinning into oncoming traffic.
Officer Steven Forsyth took the stand on the first day of testimony. Accompanying video showed Haures’ erratic driving over medians and against traffic. Forsyth’s actions helped lead to the apprehension of Haures on Industrial Parkway (off of Power Inn Drive).
Forsyth’s aid was in the form of an attempted “pit maneuver,” as he claims that he was “trying to immobilize the suspect to prevent him (from) getting out on the major roadway,” and that he only attempted that maneuver because he “didn’t want to hit (Haures) head on.”
The technique worked. Deputy John Seubert – the only felony assault on an officer charge that was upheld by the jury’s verdict – collided with the defendant head-on ending the chase. Seubert claims that he had been “on pursuit for quite some time” and that he received an “update from the helicopter that the car had pulled into the industrial area.
“I decided to not avoid him,” Seubert explained, stating, “I slowed my vehicle,” to prevent maximum impact. Police vehicles encircled Haures’ damaged SUV, leading to a series of events that culminated in Haures’ removal from the car through the sunroof, an action not shown on video (along with the tasering and dog bite of Haures, who was hospitalized).
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