Drunk persons who decide to drive are occasionally found driving while wearing little or no clothing. The release of inhibitions that is famously associated with inebriation may have something to do with this phenomenon. It happened again recently in New York when police stopped a 58-year-old woman near a Niagara Falls mall for suspected drunk driving. Police allege that she was wearing no pants and no underwear.
The suspect, according to the police, did sober up enough to put pants on prior to getting out of the car. Although her blood alcohol reading is unavailable because she refused to take a breath test, she failed three field sobriety tests, per the police report. She allegedly told the officers that she was heading home after shopping at a mall outlet, but her vehicle was allegedly heading away from her home and toward the mall.
There was a half-empty, opened bottle of tequila on the front passenger seat, the officers reported. Another typical attribute of some drunk drivers is an angry, nasty disposition that may turn into a bitter confrontation with the authorities. In this case, the defendant is accused of screaming obscenities and alleged “racial insults” at the one officer. She is accused also of spitting in another officer’s face while being fingerprinted. She will sustain an automatic driver’s license suspension for refusing the breath test.
However, the prosecution may nonetheless be able to prove drunk driving even without the blood alcohol level reading. The government can always try to prove drunk driving, i.e., driving under the influence, by other direct and circumstantial evidence in New York and other states. In this case, that will be a distinct probability for the prosecutor, due to the opened bottle of strong tequila in the car, the careless driving, unruly behavior, possibly the nudity and the numerous failures to pass the field sobriety tests.
Source: newyorkupstate.com, “Western NY woman arrested, accused of driving drunk without pants, underwear“, Geoff Herbert, Oct. 25, 2016
