Witnesses told officers that a vehicle involved in the crash June 29 that claimed the life of a Milford man was traveling at a high rate of speed.
The driver of the vehicle, Anish Daita, 31, Churchill Downs Drive, Warsaw, also failed all the sobriety tests given to him, according to a probable cause affidavit filed recently.
Daita is facing one count of causing death while operating a vehicle, a level 4 felony; and two counts of causing serious bodily injury while operating a vehicle, level 5 felonies.
On June 29, Kosciusko County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Mike Mulligan responded to a personal injury crash in the area of North CR 150W. Upon arrival, Mulligan saw a black Tesla passenger car with heavy front-end damage in a ditch on the west side of the road. He also saw KCSO deputy Matthew Francis administering standardized field sobriety tests on Daita, the driver of the Tesla.
Mulligan walked through the crash scene and saw a black Chevrolet Tahoe SUV off the road on the west side with heavy front-end damage and driver’s side damage. Mulligan saw there was a man, later identified as Joseph Criswell, 44, Milford, entrapped in the Tahoe. Criswell was pronounced dead at the scene.
Francis reported Daita submitted to the horizontal gaze nystagmus test, the walk-and-turn test and the one-leg stand test, failing all three, according to court documents.
Additionally, Daita submitted a sample on a portable breath test machine, which was positive for ethanol and provided a result of 0.115 grams of alcohol per 210 liters of breath. While in contact with Daita, Francis saw Daita’s eyes were bloodshot and watery and there was an odor of alcohol about his person. Court documents state Daita told Francis at the scene that he was coming from a friend’s house and he had consumed one alcoholic beverage about three to four hours before the crash.
While speaking with officers, Daita said he was traveling on North CR 150W, with his vehicle on auto pilot when he lost control of his vehicle and hit the Tahoe head-on.
Mulligan spoke with a witness who said she and her boyfriend were traveling north on CR 150W when - what she described as a “black bullet blew around them,” and then hit a hump in the road and became airborne. The witness said the “black bullet” was a black car and when the car went airborne, it was 2 to 3 feet in the air. When the black car landed, it started to fish-tail and shot across the center line, hitting the SUV.
Another witness said he had just left Walmart and was traveling west on West CR 300N. When he approached the stop sign at North CR 150W, he saw a vehicle approaching the same intersection from the south. He said he turned north on North CR 150W and a motorcycle followed him. The witness said he was maybe a quarter mile down the road when a black Tesla flew past him northbound at a high rate of speed. The witness saw the Tesla hit a hump in the road and all four tires of the Tesla were off the ground. The witness said when the Tesla hit the ground, it lost control and went head-on into the SUV.
During the investigation, according to the probable cause affidavit, officers learned there were a number of juveniles in the Tahoe, including one who suffered a broken femur, head trauma and other injuries and who was taken to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis for treatment. Another suffered a torn kidney and spleen; one suffered cuts and bruises and was admitted to a Fort Wayne hospital for observation; and another suffered cuts all over her body and whose face was swollen.
In Daita’s Tesla were two passengers, both who suffered non-life-threatening injuries.
The court documents say the state asserts that Daita is a substantial risk of flight; danger to self, others or the community for the following reasons: the facts and circumstances of the offense and Daita is in Kosciusko County for his employment as a manufacturing engineer working under an H-1B Visa.
The state requested an elevated bond in the matter to address the increased risk of flight and risk of safety to the community. The state also requested additional bond conditions, including, but not limited to, passport surrender and GPS monitoring to ensure his appearance at trial.
Daita was booked into the Kosciusko County Jail on Monday on a $105,000 surety and cash bond. He posted bond on Wednesday, with an initial hearing scheduled at 1 p.m. July 25 in Kosciusko Superior Court III.