Joseph Savarino, the 26-year-old grandson of Duke basketball legend Mike Krzyzewski, faces a misdemeanor charge of driving while impaired after Durham police say he struck and killed a 15-year-old boy riding an electronic bicycle just before 9 p.m. Saturday near Cole Mill Road and Wyndham Lane.
Police said Savarino was driving a Ford Explorer north on Cole Mill Road when the crash happened. The boy died at the scene. Public records show Savarino’s breathalyzer test, conducted around 12:45 a.m. Sunday, showed a 0.11 blood alcohol content, and records show he admitted to authorities that he had been drinking earlier in the night. He was being held at the Durham County Detention Center on a $100,000 secured bond before later posting bond, and a judge issued an order revoking his license.
Jack O’Shea was identified by his mother as the teenager who died. Allison O’Shea wrote on Facebook that her son died on April 18 at 15 years old and described a day that began with confession, included two baseball games and ended with an afternoon bike ride with friends. Cardinal Gibbons held a mass Monday after school in his honor.
The case lands in the shadow of another Savarino family DWI case: Michael Savarino, another grandson of Krzyzewski, was charged in 2022 and later sentenced to 12 months of probation. Michael Savarino, a walk-on for the Duke basketball team from 2020-2022, played in 13 games for his grandfather. Joseph Savarino and Michael Savarino are both sons of Debbie, Krzyzewski’s daughter.
The legal case now moves forward while a family in Durham grieves a boy his mother called brave, athletic and beloved, and the facts in the crash report will likely sit beside the memory of the life that ended at the scene.
