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Man in double-fatality DUI crash has history of drunken driving

Pictured here is Judy Schulte with her grandson Elias.

SEATTLE — A drunken driving suspect accused of hitting and killing two people and hurting two others, including a newborn, has been convicted of drunken driving two times and was driving on a suspended license.

Mark Mullan, 50, was arrested Monday after his pickup slammed into a group of people near Eckstein Middle School in Seattle's Wedgwood neighborhood.

Dennis Schulte, 66, and Judy Schulte, 68, were killed. Karina Schulte, 33, and her 10-day-old baby, Elias Jose Schulte, were critically injured.

Dennis and Judy were Elias's grandparents and Karina's inlaws. Judy was a retired employee of Northwestern School and Dennis was a retired employee of Western High School. Both schools are in Howard County, Indiana.

Detectives said Mullan failed a field sobriety test at the scene.  He was taken into custody on charges of vehicular homicide.

According to a police report, Mullan said he could not see the pedestrians crossing the street because the sun was in his eyes.

The report said Mullan admitted to having a 1 ½ ounce drink of Bacardi and 7up in the morning.

In court on Tuesday, a judge said that on the day of the crash, Mullan had a .22 blood alcohol reading, was driving on a suspended license, did not have an ignition interlock device on his vehicle and had a history of DUIs.

He was convicted of DUI two times in the 1990s and aside from Monday’s incident, Mullan has two other pending DUIs, one in Seattle and one in Snohomish County.

Because of his history, the judge set Mullan’s bail at $2.5 million.

>>> Join a community discussion about this story on our Facebook page here. "WOW, this is why they need to STOP giving people the right to drive back, after having DUI's, such BS. My son's father has had four DUI's the last one with our son in the car, and could have easily killed him, and almost killed other people, but ya know what, when he gets out of jail...... He gets his license back AGAIN," writes Melissa Bayness. "Our system failed the driver. He had an illness and was in desperate need of help. From his last DUI he should have been required to seek treatment. This is a tragedy all around," writes Alex Payne. More comments can be found here.

KIRO

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