Officers Who Handled Beto O’Rourke’s DWI Arrest Believe He Tried to Flee, Texas Tribune Reports

The former police officer who arrested Beto O’Rourke in 1998 and the sergeant who signed the report told the Texas Tribune that they both believe what was in the report: that O’Rourke tried to flee the scene at the time of his DWI arrest.The Democratic candidate for president has admitted before he was intoxicated but has denied trying to flee the scene.The Tribune reported that the investigating officer Richard Carrera and his former supervisor, Gary Hargrove, could recall specific details from that night more than 20 years ago. Both men who were with the Anthony Police Department stand by the report they compiled and signed is accurate.Hargrove, 71, oversaw the crash scene but does not remember being there. Hargrove said he reread the report after the Houston Chronicle revealed it during O’Rourke’s Senate race against Ted Cruz.The police report shows that O’Rourke, 26, was speeding in a 75 mph zone on Interstate 10 in Anthony, Texas, a town on the Texas-New Mexico line between El Paso and Las Cruces, N.M. According to the report, he lost control and hit a truck, careening into the median. An unnamed witness told police that "he attempted to leave the scene."According to the report, when Carrera asked O’Rourke if he was injured, the officer couldn’t understand what he answered “due to slurred speech.” Seeing O’Rourke’s “glossy eyes” and smelling alcohol on his breath, Carrera asked him to exit the vehicle, and he “almost fell to the floor,” Carrera wrote.The presidential candidate claimed he only had two beers but breathalyzer tests showed his blood alcohol level at 0.136 and 0.134, well above the legal limit of 0.10 at the time. “He did something to lead the officers to believe that he was trying to get away,” Hargrove told the Tribune. “What they put down, I believed them.”  Continue reading...