I'm imagining a conversation like this:
"Uh, excuse me for wakening you at this hour, Senator, but this is Commander X in precinct Y; I thought you should know that we're holding your son at the scene of a traffic accident. He wasn't injured, but he seems to be, well, not at his best..."
"What's that, Senator?"
"Oh, my; can you really do that?"
"Yes sir. Right away, sir."
(hangs up phone)
"OK, guys, you're REALLY not gonna like this, but..."
---
I think it's clear somebody leaned on the officers to do what they did; that's why the story got immediately released. They were pissed. Imagine how the guy that watched Patches plow into the barrier must have felt when somebody told him to cover up?
Do we know how much time elapsed between the accident and when he was driven home?
I didn't know they had Ambien hour at the Hawk and Dove.