A 20-year-old Mundelein man was being held in the Lake County Jail on a $100,000 bond Wednesday and charged with reckless homicide in connection with the drunken-driving death of a Waukegan man, according to authorities.
Nicholas Garcia Morales, of the 200 block of Maplewood Drive, was driving south in the northbound lanes of the Amstutz Expressway, at 12:40 a.m. Wednesday when his car collided head on with a car driven by 59-year-old Ruperto Baylon, of the 2700 block of Audrey Avenue, in Waukegan, according to Lt. James Sroka of the Waukegan Police Department.
Sroka said that Morales had a blood alcohol level of .20–well over the legal limit of .08–and was driving without a driver’s license or vehicle insurance.
Baylon, who was heading home from his housekeeping job at Abbott Laboratories, suffered multiple injuries and was taken to Provena St. Therese Hospital in Waukegan, where he died in surgery hours later, according to Lake County Chief Deputy Coroner Jim Wipper.