Man Admitting To Taking 5 Shots Before Deadly Wrong Way Crash Pleads Guilty To Murder

A man who admitted to taking 5 shots before he caused a deadly wrong-way crash that happened in Dallas in 2019 plead guilty to Murder in court on Friday.
Chaz Halston Thames is facing between 20 and 50 years in prison, according to court officials.
On October 28, 2019, Thames was headed northbound in the southbound lanes of the Dallas North Tollway when he hit and killed 57-year-old Melvin Taylor, according to police.
“He gave so much to me and my family, just for someone to take it away so soon,” daughter Crystle Taylor said in a pervious news interview.
Melvin Taylor was a Marine Veteran and a father of five. He was driving home from a concrete pour, just barely a month after starting his brand-new construction business.
The officer who was dispatched to the scene found Taylor deceased inside the driver’s seat of his car. Thames’s vehicle, a 2012 Range Rover was turned on its side.
According to the arrest warrant, the Range Rover caught on fire and the officer had to break through the sunroof with his baton to pull Thames out, he was rushed to Parkland Memorial Hospital.
At the hospital, Thames informed investigators that he was disoriented and thought he was driving west on Interstate 30 when he crashed his Range Rover into Taylor’s car in the southbound lanes of the Dallas North Tollway, according to the warrant.
Thames failed a sobriety test given at the hospital.
“His eyes were glossy, he admitted to consuming alcohol prior to crashing by saying he drank 5 shots of liquor,” also noted in the warrant.
Police officials said Thames admitted to taking five shots right before he drove the wrong way. He was first arrested and booked in jail for an intoxication manslaughter charge.
However, the charges had been upgraded to murder after investigators realized that Thames had three previous DWI convictions.
March 4, 2011: Sentence to 180 days in Fort Worth
May 1, 2013: Sentenced to 30 days in Fort Worth
November 21, 2016: Sentenced to 10 years in Tarrant County
“I don’t hate him. I just hope that somehow he can get the help he needs so that this doesn’t happen to other people,” Melvin’s wife Renee Taylor said in a previous news interview in 2019. “When he did that, he ended my life pretty much too. Now I have to go to a whole new journey.”