This week on Weird and Wacky Wednesdays: Government Property
This week’s subjects had an encounter with government property. One hit a police cruiser, one took a sheriff’s vehicle, and one did donuts on a courthouse lawn.
The Cruiser
Erin Elizabeth Hoopes, 43, struck a Charlottesville, Virginia police cruiser on July 13 while an officer was sitting in it with the emergency lights on. She was driving a red Mini Cooper and she kept going. Police caught up with her after a short pursuit and noted a strong odour of alcohol. To this point you might be thinking, “Kyla, this is not really that out of the ordinary. Why is it on Weird and Wacky Wednesdays?” To this I answer, “read on.”
At the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail she needed to conduct for a breath test. Virginia, like many places, requires a 20 minute observation period before the test so that nothing in the person’s mouth can affect the result. Ms. Hoopes asked to use the washroom. According to the officer’s report, she stood up from the toilet, put her hands in the bowl, scooped up the water and drank it.
The idea, apparently, was to contaminate the sample or maybe she thought she could lower her blood alcohol concentration. Officers simply restarted the observation period and ran the test, which came back at 0.26, more than three times the legal limit of 0.08 in Virginia. She pleaded guilty on July 30 to second offence DUI and hit and run.
Sometimes people, when under arrest for DUI, are desperate to try and provide a lower reading on an approved breathalyzer instrument. My colleague Paul once told me of a woman in the West Vancouver Police Detachment who was under investigation for impaired driving and also drank toilet water. There was also a case once in British Columbia where a fellow tried to eat his own underwear in the bathroom in the hope that it would absorb the alcohol in his stomach.
People who have been drinking too much do not make very good decisions.
See My Vest
On the night of Tuesday, September 22, a marked Broward Sheriff’s Office vehicle disappeared from the public parking lot of the Public Safety Building in Fort Lauderdale.
Florida Highway Patrol, Port St. Lucie Police and the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office found the vehicle abandoned on an off-ramp roughly 100 miles away. Deputies located a woman nearby wearing a ballistic vest with Broward Sheriff’s Office insignia on it. She was identified as Shannon Marie Dillon, 42, of Fort Lauderdale.
Her charges include grand theft of law enforcement equipment from an authorized emergency vehicle, two counts of fraud and impersonation involving the unlawful use of a police badge or law enforcement vehicle, drug paraphernalia, possession of a weapon or ammunition by a convicted felon, driving while suspended, and resisting an officer without violence.
A marked police car is about the easiest vehicle on the road to spot, and it carried her roughly 100 miles before it was found. No explanation of the plan has been reported. The ballistic vest with the sheriff’s insignia is the detail that stays with a reader.
The Lawn
Early this week, the Jennings County Sheriff’s Office in Indiana posted surveillance video taken at the county courthouse. It shows a silver sedan driving in circles on the front lawn, in reverse, throwing up grass and dirt and passing close to the trees. The woman behind the wheel was in her late sixties.
She was arrested and charged with operating a vehicle while intoxicated, along with other charges that the reports do not list. Apparently she was charged with driving with a blood alcohol concentration of 0.08 or more.
The courthouse was built between 1859 and 1860 and sits in a historic district on the National Register of Historic Places. The sheriff’s office told the public that anyone who has had a few margaritas with dinner should not drive, and should especially not do donuts on the courthouse lawn. Most courthouses have cameras all over them. It seems there is no shortage of evidence in this case.
Obviously…
Government property tends to come with cameras. A cruiser, a sheriff’s vehicle and a courthouse lawn are all places where someone is likely to be watching.
Drinking water can lower your blood alcohol concentration by an amount that is probably immeasurable. Drinking from a toilet is the type of thing you do when your blood alcohol concentration is at 0.26. Of course, this is the type of thing that makes you memorable and lands you here on a Wednesday.
