Ed DeMeo conceded that he was drunk and was driving his car before a crash that killed his friend Todd Alexander in November 2003.
But on Friday, a Dane County jury decided that DeMeo was not guilty of homicide by drunken driving after a weeklong trial in which DeMeo told jurors that Alexander had interfered with his driving and caused the crash on Madison's far East Side.
As the verdicts were read, DeMeo's family gasped and clasped hands, then hugged one another and cried as the jury's decision sunk in. Elsewhere in the courtroom, Alexander's family and friends appeared stunned and some shook their heads.
DeMeo, 36, of Madison, was in tears as he left the courtroom and wouldn't comment. But his attorney, Greg Meeker, said he was pleased with the verdict.
"We're gratified but we know that what got us here was Ed DeMeo's commitment to his innocence and a lot of hard work," said Meeker.
Alexander was killed on Nov. 9, 2003, when DeMeo lost control of his black Acura while traveling more than 60 mph on a Hayes Road curve, then smashed into a tree.
Evidence showed his blood alcohol concentration was about 0.16 percent at the time of the crash, twice the legal limit.
In emotional testimony on Thursday, DeMeo said that Alexander had put his hand on DeMeo's knee and made him push the accelerator down hard, then grabbed the emergency brake and sent the car into a skid.
DeMeo said that Alexander was trying to perform a maneuver that both had done in a video game, "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City," that they played regularly.
"'We can make it, we can make it, just like in the game,'" DeMeo said Alexander had told him. "He pulled up on the emergency brake really quick."
"Then what?" Meeker asked.
"We crashed," DeMeo said, breaking into sobs.
But Assistant District Attorney Paul Humphrey said there was no evidence, based on the skid marks left after the crash, that the emergency brake could have been pulled, or that DeMeo had even turned the steering wheel in an attempt to avoid a crash.
"(DeMeo) seems to want nothing more than to find he wasn't responsible for killing Todd Alexander," Humphrey told the jury on Friday. "I don't think you can prove that."
Humphrey said Alexander couldn't have interfered with DeMeo's driving because he was found moments after the crash still wearing a seat belt, his hands jammed into his pockets. He had suffered fatal head and heart injuries, Humphrey said, making it impossible for him to put his hands into his pockets after the crash.
Meeker disagreed, saying in his closing argument that the car had been split open by the crash and Alexander could have put his hands in his pockets to keep warm.
Meeker also said that the police reached a conclusion early on that DeMeo was guilty and then tailored the evidence to support that conclusion.
"Sometimes that's how far you have to go to get things right," Meeker said. "You have to make things up out of whole cloth."
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