Prosecutors have agreed to jail time for a teenager who was drunk and showing off his pickup truck when he crashed in western Minnesota and killed his passenger.
Izak Schermerhorn, 19, of New York Mills pleaded guilty Monday in Otter Tail County District Court to criminal vehicular homicide in connection with the single-vehicle wreck on May 27 about 5 miles north of Wadena near the rural intersection of 370th Street and 640th Avenue that killed 18-year-old Blake Unger of Bluffton, Minn.
Soon after the crash, a sheriff’s deputy administered a preliminary breath test that measured Schermerhorn’s blood alcohol content at 0.103%, the criminal complaint read. Drivers under 21 years old are not allowed to have any alcohol in their system. That level is also above the legal limit for drivers 21 and older in Minnesota. Later testing of Schermerhorn’s blood by the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension found the presence of THC.
Both teenagers attended New York Mills High School and graduated the Friday before. Unger was a three-sport athlete and was crowned homecoming king last fall.
“From a young age, Blake was always on the go,” his obituary read, “full of energy and enthusiasm for life. He had a deep passion for sports and proudly represented the New York Mills Eagles going to state in football, wrestling, and baseball.”
A deputy dispatched to the crash scene shortly before 10:30 p.m. saw deep ruts in the road where “it appeared the driver had been aggressively fishtailing back and forth along the gravel road before rolling,” the complaint read. Unger was pinned beneath the pickup.
Schermerhorn told the deputy that he drank three or four Mike’s Hard Lemonades.
