Buhach students stage crash, arrest and death for DUI awareness

Jonah Johnson was pronounced dead Wednesday morning at Buhach Colony High School and several hundred of his classmates watched as his body was taken away by a mortician from the Wilson Family Funeral Home.

Johnson, 18, was glad he wasn’t really dead.

His performance Wednesday was the macabre centerpiece of the first day of his school’s Every 15 Minutes program, an elaborate and brutal illustration of the dangers of driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol.

The program, based on the idea that at least one person nationwide is killed or injured every 15 minutes in a DUI-related crash, aims to help young drivers focus on those dangers, according to Officer Moises Onsurez of the California Highway Patrol.

Doused with fake blood, Johnson was pulled from the wreckage of the staged, two-vehicle collision, loaded into a hearse and taken away.

“It was really weird lying there. You can’t help imagining that this is what it’d be like if you actually died,” Johnson said later. “It feels a little odd taking that car ride because it’s usually the last car ride a person takes.”

Johnson’s parents went to the funeral home to identify his body. They knew it was staged, Johnson said, but it remained an emotionally charged experience. “I had to lie there as still as possible. My mom cried,” he said.

Other classmates were also involved in the performance. Students watched as Hunter Stefani failed sobriety tests and was arrested by an Atwater police officer. They learned Rose Beltran was paralyzed. They were told later that Clayton Sardella died in a helicopter ambulance en route to a hospital.

Principal Steve Hobbs said he hopes students understand the painful and potentially life-threatening consequences of impaired driving. “We’re trying to get that message to the students so they think twice in life,” Hobbs said.

The two-day event concludes Thursday with a mock funeral for Johnson and Sardella.

“We try to get a cross section of students to participate because it helps the other young people relate more to the situation,” Onsurez said. “It also helps to have all these groups and different organizations involved to really drive home the reality and the consequences and, hopefully, it helps people make positive choices going forward.”

The event was conducted with help from the CHP, California Office of Traffic Safety, Atwater police, Merced Superior Court, the Sheriff’s Department, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Riggs Ambulance, Wilson Family Funeral Home, Always Towing and Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

This story was originally published April 1, 2015 at 6:17 PM with the headline "Buhach students stage crash, arrest and death for DUI awareness."