Wedding-death suspect surrenders

A man wanted by Spokane County sheriff’s detectives following the death of his friend at a recent wedding turned himself in Tuesday to face vehicular homicide and fatal hit-and-run charges, his attorney said.

Brandon N. Peterson, 25, was taken into custody Tuesday morning, his attorney John Clark said. Peterson is charged in connection with the death of Daniel Taylor, who fell from Peterson’s 2006 Dodge Ram on Aug. 25.

According to witnesses, Taylor jumped into the back of Peterson’s truck and started jumping up and down. As Peterson and his girlfriend pulled away, Taylor fell and landed on his head on the pavement. He suffered a brain injury and died the next day.

“This is an absolute tragedy, and my client is devastated about this,” Clark said. “These young men were friends, and Daniel Taylor was well loved in this community.”

Sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Dave Reagan said in a previous press release that witnesses saw Taylor and Peterson drinking at the wedding reception inside the hall and in the parking lot of CenterPlace event center at 2426 N. Discovery Place.

However, Clark said his client twice spoke with sheriff’s deputies following Taylor’s fall, and they neither requested nor took any breath or blood evaluations to test whether Peterson had been drinking.

According to court documents, authorities were not able to interview Peterson until they found him at his girlfriend’s home more than six hours later. The girlfriend told deputies she did not contact police at the crime scene, documents state.

In his press release last Friday, Reagan said Peterson never identified himself as the driver to investigators at the scene and later hid the pickup at his grandmother’s apartment complex.

“That isn’t true,” Clark said of the press release. “Apparently, one other partygoer said that (Peterson) wasn’t the driver. (Peterson) was unaware that (investigators) didn’t know. When he was approached by police, Mr. Peterson only told the truth.”

But court documents state Peterson’s female passenger told deputies she and Peterson hid the truck. Peterson told deputies he was scared, and his girlfriend moved the truck to a parking stall, according to documents. He said they then drove it to an apartment complex so it wouldn’t get towed, then his girlfriend drove them both back to her home, the documents state.

Reagan also wrote in the press release that Peterson lived a “transient lifestyle,” and it appeared that he was avoiding arrest.

Clark said his client has sole custody of a 7-year-old son and was simply moving from one apartment to the other this weekend. As for avoiding arrest, Clark said he personally told sheriff’s Detective Don Manning that Peterson would turn himself in the first day court was back in session, which was Tuesday.

“He’s lived in this area his entire life,” Clark said of Peterson, who has no previous felony convictions. “They have the completely wrong idea about this guy.”

Reagan said he repeated in his press release only what Spokane County sheriff’s investigators told him about the incident.