Posted on 04/24/2015 11:33:37 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Newly released California Highway Patrol dashcam video shows an impaired California State Senator Ben Hueso undergoing sobriety tests and answering questions before his August arrest.
In the footage, the San Diego senator is seen driving the wrong way onto a one-way street in Sacramento on Aug. 22. He quickly U-turns, but a CHP officer is quickly on his tail, pulling him over at a nearby gas station.
Hueso gets out of his car and is asked to do field sobriety tests. At the officer’s request, he walks back and forth in a straight line.
He is then asked to do a voluntary breathalyzer test.
“But I’m also a politician,” said Hueso, “and I work with politicians that have been through this process, that have not been given a fair process.”
The CHP officer argues that he has been very honest. He explains Hueso will have to submit to either a blood test or breathalyzer at the station if he is arrested on suspicion of DUI.
Hueso tells the officer that he has to be careful what he does from a legal perspective.
“Whether you decide tonight, you know what, I’m under the influence or not, I have seen some of my colleagues be dragged out to a really horrible legal process,” he is heard saying.
While he says the officer has behaved professionally, Hueso admits he’s worried about his ulterior motives.
When asked if he knows what the legal limit is in California, the senator says it’s not about his blood alcohol content – it’s about whether the officer finds him impaired to drive.
“I admit that I made a wrong turn because there wasn’t – I’m not that familiar with this town. And I was trying to find a way to get back on the freeway,” said Hueso.
When he again refuses the extra test, the CHP officer informs Hueso he is being arrested for DUI. CHP officials later said he had a BAC of 0.08.
However, months later, Hueso pleaded guilty to a lesser “wet reckless” charge because prosecutors have a hard time proving DUI when a defendant only registers a 0.08.
The day after he was released on bond, Hueso released a statement that said, in part, “I am truly and profoundly sorry for the unacceptably poor personal judgment which I demonstrated last night.”
In December, he was sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to undergo a six-week alcohol program.
Hueso currently represents California's 40th District, which covers southern San Diego County, as well as parts of Riverside and Imperial counties.
Independent?
"I stabbed guys like you in the back before lunch in my day!"
How could the local reporter at San Diego KNSD know which political party Ben Hueso is affiliated with? Hueso has held elective office in San Diego for only eight to ten years. Maybe he is a member of the Bull Moose party. /s
islamidemocommucrat
Gop or dem doesn’t matter in this case. He looked ok to me, so he made a wrong turn. This is simply another example of the gestapo conflating an improper turn into a DUI with all the intendent costs and humilition that goes with it. The dui thing in Cal, and many other states, is a cabal of police, defense attorneys, insurance companies and post arrest training institutions, mostly staffed by former cops, designed to extract money from the driving public IMO.
When the local fifth-column leftist media skanks doesn't mention the political party, you know what political party the media skanks are not mentioning.
Don’t drink and drive, and you won’t have this problem.
But that’s what politicians are supposed to do.
Fine as long as you are also willing to criminalize driving while tired, while eating, while dehydrated, while having noisy children in the car, etc etc.
See Mouton's post #6 for the real reason behind this DUI.
Thanks ROTB for the props.
I noticed he was not convicted of due or impairment either, he was convicted of “wet reckless (like we cannot prove anything but made up a charge that covers everything)” yet sentenced to 6 weeks of anti alcohol abuse training which costs: “Fee For 6 Week California Wet Reckless Program: $243.00” plus other fees. It is like Stalin’s Russia: show me the man, I will show you the crime.
He is a Mechista communist member of the DEMOCRAT Party. Mechistas believe that the most of America was stolen from the Mexican Aztec indians, although no Aztec was ever within a 1,000 miles of California. Hueso is a first class scum bag.
.08 is a bogus limit. the average person has squat for “impairment” at that level.
Squat is driving the wrong way. This week in Sacramento we had a 18 year old drive the wrong way in view of the state capital bldg. She hit a vehicle with three old guys. The battery was killed so the other driver did not see the wreck and ran into it. The gas tank was cut open the the four people in the wreck died.
Yeah, let's make policy decisions by anecdotes. That's the ticket! (so to speak)
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