A 26-year-old office worker who was paralyzed from her shoulders down after she drove drunk the wrong way down Interstate 5 has filed an $18.7 million suit against her boss for buying her drinks and the restaurant that served them.

In the suit filed last week in Multnomah County Circuit Court, Ashley Schutz claims that she felt obligated to join

and two co-workers at La Costita restaurant in Southwest Portland on Dec. 12, 2008 because she worried about keeping her job and wanted a promotion at her company,

. The suit also states that she worried that her supervisor might think she didn’t like him if she turned down his invitation, as she had with other work-related invitations in the past.

The suit states that O’Brien bought alcoholic drinks from 5 p.m. until 9 p.m. for the group of employees, and that the company approved the expenses as a way to build camaraderie. The suit claims that even after she became drunk, O’Brien bought her more drinks, “which were involuntarily consumed by (Schutz).”

Schutz, who was 24 at the time, drove off in her 2001 BMW. At

, she entered an exit ramp to I-5 northbound driving the wrong way and crashed into a 2002 Acura near the Macadam exit. Her blood alcohol level was 0.24 percent — three times the legal limit for driving.

A passenger in the Acura suffered minor injuries, but Schutz broke more than a dozen bones, including her C4 and C5 vertebrae. She is a quadriplegic. The suit states that Schutz’s medical bills and therapy have reached about $900,000, and her future care will cost an estimated $5 million.

Two minutes after the crash, O’Brien sent her and another employee who’d been at the restaurant a text message that stated: “Let me know if you two make it home okay,” according to the suit.

Schutz was convicted of drunken driving and fourth degree assault. She was sentenced to two days in jail and one year of probation.

Renata DeMuro, who was driving with two friends when Schutz struck her car, was astonished to learn that Schutz was suing. DeMuro believes the crash was entirely Schutz's fault.

"I was really shocked to see she would do something like this to get money," DeMuro said.

The lawsuit is unusual in that bars and restaurants are rarely sued in Oregon for allegedly over-serving customers because plaintiffs must prove that a business knowingly served a visibly intoxicated person. What makes the suit even more unusual is that the victims of drunken drivers — not the drunken drivers themselves — are usually the ones that do the suing.

O’Brien Constructors and

couldn’t immediately be reached for comment for this story. Schutz’s attorneys — at the law offices of

and

— also couldn’t be reached immediately for any additional comment.

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