When Mark Sterner took his first drink on the last night of spring break in 1994, all that he expected was to have a few drunken mishaps and good times with his best friends.
He had not anticipated that by the end of the night, three of his friends would be dead, and he would be fighting for his life in the hospital.
Sterner spoke to a crowd largely comprised of AU athletes on Monday, Oct. 19, about the night when he made the decision to drink and drive while on spring break in Florida, a decision that ruined his life.
Sterner, who was judged to be the “least drunk” of the five men after they visited a bar, was driving to another bar with his friends when he struck a tree, killing three of his passengers.
Sterner showed the audience a video that he had taped that night of him and his friends drinking and going to the bar.
“This video was never made to be shown to an audience,” Sterner said. “It was supposed to be something we’d look back on years later and laugh about how stupid we were in college. But because of what happened that night I would never get to watch this video with my friends.”
The video shows four men doing shots of Jagermeister and whiskey and driving 100 miles per hour in a 35 mile-per-hour zone on the way to the bar. Once at the bar, the four friends did more shots and danced to live music in a nearly empty bar.
About 15 minutes after Sterner stopped videotaping, the men headed off to the next bar in Sterner’s rented Lincoln Towncar. As he was driving, his right wheel veered slightly off the road. Sterner steered hard to the left to get back on the road, crossed over to the right side of the road, and hit a tree at 65 miles per hour. He and his friends were thrown 40 yards from the car. His friends Aaron, Jim and Pete were instantly killed.
Sterner’s friend Darren sustained minor injuries, but Sterner was so badly wounded that the paramedics who responded to the scene were surprised he was still alive.
“The paramedic said he checked my pulse more to confirm that I was dead than to see if I was alive,” Sterner said.
Sterner was rushed to the hospital and did not regain full consciousness for two weeks. Not long after he regained consciousness, he was visited by two police officers. They formally charged Sterner with three counts of DUI manslaughter. He was sentenced to three years in a Florida prison.
Sterner said being in prison was a frightening experience because he was forced to live with men who had been convicted of violent crimes. Many of the men in prison had sentences ranging from 15 years to life without parole, so Sterner’s three-year sentence made him an easy target for prison violence.
“I don’t care how tough you are, or how tough you think you are — when you’re dealing with people who have nothing to lose, nothing to care about but their reputation, they’re not going to lose a fight to a college kid,” Sterner said. “I woke up every day not knowing if I would live to see the next day.”
Sterner was released from prison in 1997. Since then, he has tried numerous times to reconnect to his friend Darren, the only other survivor of the accident. However, Darren refuses to talk to Sterner because it “brings up too many bad memories, too many things he’d rather forget.”
Sterner told the audience that even though he cannot force them to make the right decisions, he hopes the speech will help students learn and make wise decisions about drinking.
“I’m not coming here to tell anyone what to do,” Sterner said. “I’m just coming to tell you about what happened one night to me and my friends. My friends are dead because of me, and I would give up my life in a heartbeat if I could bring them back. I relive the worst night of my life over and over so that no one else ever has to live with what I live with.”
You can reach this staff writer at jryan@theeagleonline.com.
