Brownsville,TX : Driver in fatal crash appears in court on January, Thursday 4th 2018

The attorney for a man accused of driving the wrong way on Boca Chica Boulevard last March and fleeing the scene after causing a head-on collision that killed a man said his client may have been asleep at the wheel.

“We intend to bring up the defense that he may have fallen asleep at the wheel,” Alberto Garcia said Thursday during a motion hearing in the 404th state District Court in front of visiting Judge Leonel Alejandro.

Garcia represents Marving Andres Resendiz Zumaya, 24, who was indicted on May 24, 2017, on counts of accident involving death, criminal negligent homicide and manslaughter following a March 16, 2017, car crash that killed 79-year-old Martin Abundis Medrano.

He is being held in the Cameron County Carrizales-Rucker Detention Center on $250,000 in bonds for each count.

At the time, Brownsville police reported that Zumaya abandoned his vehicle and fled on foot after driving eastbound against traffic in a white Ford F150 on the 4000 block of Boca Chica Boulevard, striking the front end of the Ford Ranger driven by Medrano.

Garcia had filed a notice of intent to use a diminished capacity defense, but Cameron County Assistant District Attorney Sarah Pemelton objected to that, saying Texas law only allows for an insanity diminished capacity defense, not an asleep-at-the-wheel diminished capacity defense.

“Regardless of case law, that is one of our defensive issues,” Garcia said.

Alejandro didn’t rule on the notice or objection, saying the court can rule on that at trial.

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Driver in fatal crash appears in court