Troubling Details Emerge in 'Affluenza Kid' Crash

Teen, parents gave deposition in lawsuit
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 17, 2015 8:29 AM CDT
Troubling Details Emerge in 'Affluenza Kid' Crash
In this December 2013 image taken from a video by KDFW-FOX 4, Ethan Couch is seen during a court hearing in Fort Worth, Texas.    (AP Photo/KDFW-FOX 4, File)

The Texas teenager who killed four people while driving drunk and got off with probation thanks to an "affluenza' defense says he doesn't even remember the crash. In newly released deposition footage, Ethan Couch says he believed his parents knew that he was a drinker and his mom had warned him not to drink and drive the night of the June, 2013 crash, ABC reports. "I've taken Valium, Hydrocodone, marijuana, cocaine, Xanax, and I think I tried Ecstasy once," says Couch, who testified that he was often allowed to stay alone at the family's second home. Couch, who is now 18, was three times over the legal blood-alcohol limit for an adult when he crashed his father's pickup truck, and he says he doesn't even remember leaving the house.

The newly released footage also includes video of Couch's parents talking about the boy's upbringing, WFAA reports. Both parents admitted that the teen had issues with alcohol and although his mother claimed he was sometimes punished, she couldn't recall the last time that happened, the New York Daily News reports. Months before the deadly crash, Couch received a summons for an incident that included drunk-driving allegations, and his mother says she "should have" realized that if he wasn't punished, he would probably end up drinking and driving again. The final crash lawsuit was settled last week and Couch is now out of rehab and working at his father's sheet-metal company, reports ABC. (Last year, Couch's father was charged with impersonating a police officer.)

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