Mom Arrested For DWI With Son In Car Twice
HASTINGS, Minn. (WCCO) -- For the second time in just the past year, a Minnesota mom has been picked up for drinking and driving.
Susan Stevens, 43, was arrested last December in West St. Paul for driving drunk with her then 8-year-old son in the car with her. On Monday, it happened again -- this time, at a parking lot of her son's school in Mendota Heights.
Officials arrested Stevens in Mendota Heights just before 3:30 p.m. Monday. She was arrested on probable cause DWI and driving after her license had been canceled indefinitely.
"My understanding was that she was trying to pick up her son," Mario Reyes, of the Mendota Heights Police Department, said. "She said that she just wanted to get her son and leave, that's what she told the officer."
The problem was, besides Stevens' revoked license, when the officer opened the door to her car, he also found an open bottle containing alcohol.
Investigators are concerned since Stevens was trying to pick her son up from school during a time when parents and children were walking around the parking lot after school.
"She's in an altered state and now she's going to operate a motor vehicle with her child in it, along with other traffic present. That's not a good situation," Reyes said.
Court records show that in May, Stevens pleaded guilty to a DWI charge stemming from the December arrest. Three other charges were dismissed in the plea agreement. She was sentenced to two years of supervised probation for refusing to submit to an alcohol test during the investigation, a gross misdemeanor.
The charges from that incident had said a concerned woman called police after seeing Stevens with her son in a Cub Foods in West St. Paul.
"He was saying, 'Mommy, I want to go home. Let's go home mommy,'" said the woman who called 911. "I went up to her and asked if she was okay and she didn't answer me. She was like, stumbling. So, I had my instincts kicked in."
She told investigators she watched Stevens get into the SUV with the boy and drive away. She was stopped by law enforcement less than a mile away on Highway 110, according to court documents.
The officer reported that a preliminary breath test showed a blood alcohol level of more than .40, but she would not agree to another test after being arrested. A level of .40 is five times the legal limit of .08.
"And she's probably done it before and just hasn't been caught," Reyes said.
Having a child in the vehicle is considered an aggravating factor, which can raise a misdemeanor DWI charge to a gross misdemeanor. First degree DWI, a felony charge, is reserved for drunken drivers who've been caught four times within 10 years or have previously been convicted of first degree DWI.
In addition to charges of driving under the influence and driving with a canceled license, Stevens faces three other charges.
Stevens initially did not let the police officer into her vehicle, and refused to take a breath test.
If found guilty of the latest DUI charge, it would be her fifth DUI since 1987.
After she was arrested at Mendota Elementary School, her son was picked up by his father.
Stevens' husband spoke to police when he came to pick up the boy. He told them his wife had a drinking problem and alcohol was missing from their home.
