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Back seat drunk driving. You can’t ignore it.

State Police arrested Fawn Bartles, of Claysburg, for back seat drunk driving and an additional count of barking orders at an officer, the magistrate and several passers-by.

Police observed a car driven by Bartles’ boyfriend, Abner Bentalot, jump the curb, drive down the sidewalk, take a left turn in a right-hand turning lane, and proceed the wrong way down a one-way street. Police pulled over Bentalot for suspicion of operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol, or at the very least, drugs.

Police discovered he was actually under the influence of Bartles. Police said Bartles admitted that she was back seat driving and became verbally abusive to the officers.

“Hit the curb? Hit the curb?” Bartles said. “I told him to get closer to the sidewalk, I had a correspondence to mail and I ain’t walking any more than I have to. ‘Cause I got a trick foot. It’s trick is, it’ll lodge itself up your keister, if you don’t let us get on about our way.”

Bentalot told police that Bartles is a serial back seat drunk driver. He said she had been pulled over for sidecar drunk driving during the Thunder in the Valley motorcycle rally a few years ago.

If convicted, Bartles may be forced to use a breathalyzer before she climbs in the back seat of any vehicle.

State police officer Brenden McCormick said that habitual back seat drunk drivers are making Blair County roads unsafe.

“If you see a vehicle make a sudden and erratic manuever, chances are someone is operating the vehicle under the influence of a drunk back seat driver,” McCormick said. “Or some clown from Jersey on a cell phone.”
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