Driver's blood alcohol was 0.19 long after fatal crash

RALEIGH -- Raymond D. Cook, the plastic surgeon facing a second-degree murder charge, had a blood-alcohol content more than twice the legal limit several hours after the collision that ended the life of an aspiring professional ballerina, according to court documents released Monday.

Cook was indicted Monday by a Wake County grand jury on charges of second-degree murder and driving while impaired. He is accused of driving drunk and nearly twice as fast as the posted speed limit on Sept. 11 when his Mercedes-Benz slammed into the back of a Hyundai driven by Elena Bright Shapiro, a 20-year-old from Winston-Salem in training with Carolina Ballet.

A search warrant released Monday says investigators drew blood from Cook nearly two hours after the collision on Strickland Road that ended Shapiro's life. State Bureau of Investigation lab test results indicated that blood sample had an alcohol concentration of 0.19, more than twice the legal limit of 0.08, according to the warrant.

The information was included in a warrant investigators applied for to search Cook's iPhone.

Officers investigating the crash scene near Strickland and Lead Mine roads found the black cell phone on the driver's side floorboard, according to the warrant application. Investigators hope to retrieve phone call and text records to determine whether Cook was using his phone either at the time of or shortly before the collision.

"A witness statement taken in the course of this investigation reveals that Mr. Cook made a spontaneous statement which leads me to believe that Mr. Cook may have been on the phone either at the time of the crash or just prior to the crash," Officer E.J. Sweden said in the search warrant application.

Efforts to reach Roger W. Smith Jr., the Raleigh lawyer representing Cook, were unsuccessful Monday.

Cook, according to witnesses, was at the Raleigh Country Club in East Raleigh for at least 4-1/2 hours on Sept. 11 before he ended up at Piper's Tavern and Restaurant, a North Raleigh tavern where owners say he was refused service after stumbling in the dining room.

Billy McGee and Jimmy Powers, owners of Piper's, said Cook appeared to be intoxicated when he arrived at their bar on Falls of Neuse Road about 7 p.m. Friday.

Piper's owners have said Cook turned down offers from a manager at the tavern to get him a ride home. Tavern employees said the doctor left the tavern about 8:15 p.m. with a woman with whom he had been sitting.

Cook, who surrendered his medical license and gave up posts at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Medicine and Wake Med, is out on bail.

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