The mayor of a Jefferson County town was arrested Tuesday following an incident outside a White Castle restaurant, police say.
Beverly Chester-Burton, mayor of Shively, was charged with driving under the influence after police say she fell asleep in the drive-thru line and later crashed her car in a nearby parking lot.
Officers with the Louisville Metro Police Department were dispatched around 11 p.m. near the White Castle following a report of a woman who drove into a utility pole.
Officers found “heavy front-end damage” to the vehicle and Chester-Burton standing outside with the smell of alcohol on her breath, according to an arrest citation.
Chester-Burton, 59, told officers “her accelerator got stuck inside the White Castle parking lot” and she exited the parking lot to avoid crashing into other vehicles, the citation says.
Witnesses said they had knocked on Chester-Burton’s car window to try to wake her up as she had fallen asleep in the restaurant’s drive-thru line, according to police.
Before crashing into the pole, Chester-Burton struck the rear of a truck, which was pushed into another vehicle, police said.
Chester-Burton who is listed on the citation as 4-foot-11 and 127 pounds, initially told officers she had two martinis with dinner around 5 p.m., according to police. But then she said she had the drinks at 9 p.m. — two hours before police were dispatched.
She failed numerous field sobriety tests and also “failed to follow instructions as given even after being instructed multiple times,” police said.
Records show Chester-Burton refused a blood test.
Chester-Burton was released from jail Wednesday morning, WDRB reported. She was scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday afternoon, court records show.
Shively, a suburb of Louisville, is home to about 15,000 people.
Courtesy of Kentucky.com
