Police: Man Drove Drunk in NK as Girls Threw Bottles from Car

A report of an erratic driver with passengers flinging beer bottles from the car on Thursday afternoon led to North Kingstown police arresting a group of people from Massachusetts on a variety of charges including driving under the influence, disorderly conduct, obstruction of justice, public drunkenness and indecent exposure.

Police said John C. White IV., 26, of 401 Mendon Road, North Attleboro, is facing charges of driving under the influence and refusing a chemical test; his passengers, four females of which one is a 17-year-old juvenile, are facing an assortment of charges for yelling at police, giving false dates of birth, urinating on the side of the road during the traffic stop, running into the road during the traffic stop and repeatedly screaming “I know my rights, you don’t have probable cause.”

Officers were first dispatched at around 4:20 p.m. after reports of a silver Honda driving erratically with bottles being thrown out of the window before pulling into a parking lot across from the The Carriage Inn and Saloon at 1065 Tower Hill Road.

Patrol officers fanned out and eventually spotted the car on Oak Hill Road and White, the driver, was eventually stopped on Esker Lane.

Patrol Officer Michael J. Bernardo, in a police report, stated that he could immediately smell alcohol from inside the car as he approached it. He then saw the passenger had an open beer bottle at her feet.

As Bernardo began to address White, the females “became very loud, talking over me and becoming visibly upset and agitated stating that no one threw anything out of the windows.”

White told police that they were coming from Scarborough Beach and he was heading home to Massachusetts. He said he had two Rolling Rock beers and a shot of Fireball whiskey about two hours earlier.

After failing a field sobriety test, White registered a .112 blood alcohol reading in a preliminary breath test at the scene.

As White was being assessed, backup arrived to watch over the females in the car, who reportedly continued to act very disorderly and argumentative, swearing at police and taking videos with their phones while screaming and yelling.

Once under arrest, police asked if any of the females were OK to drive the car, to which one female, identified by police as Koree Hudgins, said she only had one drink and was OK. A breath test, however, showed she had a blood alcohol reading of .187.

Once police determined everyone was drunk, the females were ordered out and to sit on the grass shoulder of Esker Lane to provide ID.

More backup arrived to assist “because the females all appeared to be highly intoxicated and continued to run toward the street, not follow orders and yell and swear at officers at the scene.”

The front seat passenger, identified as Angela Soule, reportedly gave police three different dates of birth and had no ID. When an officer approached the car she reportedly was urinating in a bottle and again urinated on the shoulder of Esker Lane with her pants down.

Police charged Soule with disorderly conduct (indecent exposure), obstruction of justice and public drunknennes.

Hudgins was charged with disorderly conduct, obstruction of justice and resisting arrest for corroborating Soule’s false birth dates, police said, as well as running into the road during the investigation and flailing her arms when police were trying to put her into handcuffs.

Once she was finally put in the back of a police cruiser, police said, Hudgins “slipped her hand out of one of the handcuffs and put a Fireball whiskey bottle down her shorts.”

Another female passenger, a 17-year-old juvenile from Plainville, Mass., reportedly gave police false information and repeatedly ran into the road as police conducted their investigation. When Hudgins was being taken into custody, the juvenile ran over to the cruiser and said “arrest me, arrest me” and “my father is a lawyer, I know my rights.”

She was charged with disorderly conduct and obstruction of justice.

A fourth female, identified as Danielle Lima, was “immediately acting disorderly” when police first came to the stopped car. She yelled that police had no reason to stop the car and kept repeating “I know my rights, you don’t have probable cause.”

Lima was charged with disorderly conduct, obstruction of justice and resisting arrest.

The car was towed to Quonset Auto Body and a search turned up four open bottles of alcohol and numerous empty bottles, police said.

All those arrested except for the juvenile appeared before a justice of the peace and were released on personal recognizance. They are due to return to Third Division District Court on July 14.

The juvenile’s case will be adjudicated in Family Court.

The incident occurred on the eve of the start of the Independence Day weekend at a time when area police are stepping up patrols to catch drunk drivers.

Chief Thomas J. Mulligan of North Kingstown police said that “hopefully, this is not an indication of the coming summer months.”