Judge sets preliminary hearing for teacher in DUI-related accident

By Dave Toplikar

Friday, Feb. 10, 2012 | 9:42 a.m.

It’s been six days since Noel Lardeo’s car went out of control, striking a bus bench and critically injured a 15-year-old boy sitting there in what Metro Police are saying was a DUI-related accident.

Early Friday morning, the Las Vegas teacher finally got to see the formal complaint lodged against her by the the district attorney’s office, charging her with causing a substantial injury while driving drunk.

Lardeo, a first-grade teacher at the Roger Bryan Elementary School, sat quietly this morning in the courtroom as she looked through the two-page document.

As she read, she wiped tears from her eyes several times, bending forward because her arms were restricted by chains connected to her waist.

She then looked down at her crossed legs, which were shackled together with a loose chain at her ankles. And she waited silently, speaking briefly to her attorney before her arraignment.

When her case was called, Lardeo stood as her attorney, Frank Cofer, told the judge she waived her right to a formal reading of the complaint. Cofer said she also waived the right to have a preliminary hearing within 15 days.

Justice of the Peace Suzan Baucum set her preliminary hearing for 9 a.m. April 2 in Las Vegas Justice Court.

Cofer then went over and spoke briefly to Lardeo, who was later returned to the Clark County Detention Center, where she is being held on $250,000 bail.

Outside the courtroom, Cofer said he had no comment.

The complaint charged Lardeo with a Class B felony of driving and being in actual physical control while under the influence of intoxicating liquor causing death and/or substantial bodily harm to the victim, identified in the complaint as Conan Obenchain. Prosecutors said earlier this week the boy was expected to lose at least one of his legs.

The complaint did not say exactly how much alcohol was in Lardeo's blood sample, except that it was at least .08 or more, which is the legal threshold for DUI.

According to a police report, the accident occurred about 5:08 a.m. Sunday at Spring Mountain Road and El Camino Road.

Officers said when they arrived Lardeo was out of her vehicle, a 2005 Acura, attempting to assist the victim.

Police said her car had struck the curb east of the bus bench, then run up onto the sidewalk and into the bus bench. Police said “the vehicle was making sudden steering inputs and a high rate of speed before it struck the curb.”

Lardeo told officers that her right front tire was low and that she suddenly lost control, being pulled to the right, off of the road, and struck the bus bench.

She told police that she had picked up her roommate, 36-year-old Artemio Rios, from work and that they were heading home. The officer asked her if she had been drinking any alcohol that day and she said no.

The officer she he conducted three field sobriety tests. He said when she took the Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus test, there were six clues out of six that she was impaired.

In the Walk-And-Turn test, she had four out of eight clues she was impaired, the arrest report said.

The officer also said he then conducted the One-Leg Stand test and saw two clues out of four she was impaired.

Lardeo was then offered a preliminary breath test. She consented to that and received a failing result, the officer said.

After placing her under arrest, the officer confronted Lardeo about why she had denied drinking alcohol earlier.

“She state that she had drunk alcohol, ‘the night before,’ and that she was supposed to be the designated driver,” the officer wrote in the arrest report. “She went on to state that she was drinking at home and that she stopped at about 8 or 9 p.m. And that she slept a little before being called to pick up her roommate.”

Police said witnesses said they saw the car had run the red light when westbound on Spring Mountain at Jones. And another witness said Lardeo’s vehicle had passed them at a high rate of speed west of Jones on the left and started skidding in front of them before running off of the road and hitting the bus bench.

The arrest report said police saw two open, partially consumed containers of vodka in the vehicle.