A 29-year-old man from Pharr charged in a deadly early morning wreck last Thursday is accused of causing the crash that killed his friend.
Christian Antonio Salazar is charged with intoxication manslaughter with a vehicle and intoxication assault with a vehicle causing serious bodily injury, charges which stem from the crash that killed Hugo Carlos Gonzalez.
An affidavit for his arrest said a Pharr police officer was in the 900 block of East Nolana when he pulled up to a major accident at about 2:12 a.m. and saw a blue Hyundai Elantra with major front-end damage inside the eastbound lane facing westbound and a blue GMC Terrian SUV off the side of the road in a grassy area.
The driver of that vehicle complained of back pain but did not appear to have life-threatening injuries, according to a probable cause affidavit.
The officer then wrote in a report that Salazar exited the Hyundai Elantra and was screaming and asking for help, claiming his friend was dying, the affidavit stated.
Authorities found Gonzalez on the passenger side floorboard and said he was unresponsive. He died at the hospital at 2:58 a.m., according to police.
“Officer Rosas will testify that while speaking with the defendant he asked him where they were coming from in which he advised a bar called the Rockwell in McAllen and advised they both had alcoholic beverages to drink,” the affidavit stated.
That conversation happened at the hospital, according to the affidavit.
Police say Salazar failed standardized field sobriety exams and was arrested.
Authorities have obtained a warrant for a sample of his blood.
This is Salazar’s third alcohol-related arrest in less than five years.
Court records indicate he was first arrested for a driving while intoxicated charge on Jan. 20, 2017.
He pleaded guilty to that charge on May 18, 2017, and was sentenced to one-year probation with a suspended sentence of one-year in the Hidalgo County Adult Detention Center.
However, the Hidalgo County District Attorney’s Office briefly sought to revoke that probation after Salazar was arrested on another charge of driving while intoxicated on Feb. 9, 2018.
Prosecutors later dismissed their efforts to revoke Salazar’s probation, and he was released from probation on Oct. 3, 2018.
Salazar pleaded guilty to his second DWI case on May 6 and was sentenced to two years of probation with a suspended one-year sentence in the county jail.
He remains jailed on a total of $350,000 in bonds, records show.
