North Haverhill
A grand jury sitting in Grafton County Superior Court in North Haverhill last week indicted two entities connected with Peking Tokyo with a single count each of prohibited sales, a Class B felony.
The restaurant, which is on the Lebanon Mall, served Daniel Cowdrey two large “scorpion bowl” drinks, which contain several different types of liquor, on May 25, the indictment said.
Cowdrey is charged with aggravated driving while intoxicated and negligent homicide after police say he drove a Subaru Legacy northbound in the southbound lanes of Interstate 89 shortly before 9 p.m. on May 25, causing one crash near Exit 19 in Lebanon and then colliding just south of Exit 20 with an oncoming car driven by Ellynn Koelsch, 34, of Cranston, R.I.
Koelsch — a physical therapist who was planning to move to Vermont with her husband, who had accepted a campus ministry job — was pronounced dead at the scene. The only passenger in her car, the couple’s 4-year-old son, Anthony, was injured and hospitalized as a result of the crash.
According to a New Hampshire State Police affidavit filed shortly after the crash, Cowdrey told Trooper Janell Smith that he “had a few beers with some friends” at Peking Tokyo and then headed home to Vermont.
The indictment said the restaurant served Cowdrey two large scorpion bowl drinks, which authorities defined as “an alcoholic beverage made up of multiple liquors,” and that Peking Tokyo should “have known that Daniel Cowdrey would have become intoxicated after consuming the first scorpion bowl beverage.”
State law says a prohibited sale includes serving “an individual who is visibly intoxicated or who a reasonable and prudent person would know is intoxicated.”
Peking Tokyo’s website describes the eatery as a “Chinese and Japanese restaurant with a sushi bar and lounge.”
A woman working at Peking Tokyo’s front desk said neither the owner nor manager was available on Wednesday afternoon.
The restaurant has two trade names registered with the New Hampshire Secretary of State’s Office. The first is “Peking Tokyo of Lebanon,” which is owned by C&R Rock Inc. The second is “Peking Tokyo Restaurant,” which is owned by PT Red Tree Inc.
PT Red Tree registered Peking Tokyo Restaurant as a trade name on April 11, 2016, and the filing was accompanied by an April 28 letter from C&R Rock Inc., which said it “has no objection to the registration of Peking Tokyo Restaurant by PT Red Tree Inc.”
Both of those corporations list 45 Hanover St. as a business address. Jinmu Lu is listed as the owner of PT Red Tree Inc. and Jin Huang as the president of C&R Rock. Messages left for both were not returned.
The indictment lists “Peking Tokyo and/or PT Red Tree Inc.” and “Peking Tokyo and/or C&R Rock Inc.” as the defendants and identifies each entity as a “corporation and licensee.”
Grafton County Attorney Lara Saffo on Wednesday said she could not comment on the facts of the pending case, including explaining why the separate entities were charged. No individual server has been charged in the case.
Asked about the potential penalties under the prohibited sales charge, Saffo said, “a corporation obviously can’t be incarcerated. They can be fined.” She said a fine in such a case could run up to $100,000. “It’s not unusual to charge a business. It doesn’t happen a lot,” Saffo said. “It’s a tool out there to address behaviors.”
Smith, the state trooper, said she had observed “very slurred speech, and glassy bloodshot eyes” from Cowdrey after the crash and that he “appeared to have an odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from his breath,” according to the police affidavit, which was prepared by another trooper. Smith also said that as Cowdrey was being brought into the hospital he said, “I’m just a drunk buffoon,” according to the affidavit.
Police took three blood samples from Cowdrey in the hours after the crash, but the blood alcohol content readings have not been publicly released. Cowdrey, who turned 39 in September, is free on bail and has yet to be indicted.
The New Hampshire Liquor Commission in early June told the Valley News it was investigating the circumstances surrounding the sale of alcohol to Cowdrey on the night of the crash. Messages left for James Wilson, the chief of Enforcement and Licensing, were not returned on Wednesday. Saffo said the liquor agents were part of the investigative team in the case.
In an unrelated case, a 22-year-old Lebanon man who was a server at Peking Tokyo was among eight restaurant workers and store clerks in the city charged by Lebanon police and the state liquor commission after he allegedly delivered a Samuel Adams beer to an underage customer who was part of a mid-October sting.
Cowdrey, who was working for a property maintenance firm at the time of the May accident, was listed as the at-fault driver in a collision in Woodstock in 2001, according to court records.
Traffic court records indicate he crossed the center line on Route 4 in December 2001 and collided with an oncoming vehicle. Cowdrey had a BAC of .046, court records said, which was within the legal limit. He was given a traffic ticket, but no criminal charges were filed in the Woodstock crash.
News staff writer Tim Camerato contributed to this report. John Gregg can be reached at jgregg@vnews.com or 603-727-3217.