Police: Lawmaker failed sobriety tests

AUSTIN (KXAN) - State Rep. Naomi Gonzalez slurred her speech and had difficulty counting backwards when she was interviewed by a police officer about a half hour after being taken to the hospital with injuries from a car crash, according to the affidavit accompanying her arrest warrant.

Gonzalez, an El Paso Democrat in her second term in the Texas House, was relased from jail Thursday afternoon on a $5,000 bond after being charged with driving while intoxicated. She was involved in a rear-end crash on South Congress Avenue near Barton Springs Road around 2 a.m. Thursday.

She and two others, including a bicyclist, suffered minor injuries.

The arrest warrant affidavits say that the police officer, who is trained administrator of field-sobriety tests, said he could smell alcohol "emitting from (Gonalez's) person from about four feet away when he interviewed her at the hospital.

As he drew nearer and listened to her speak, the officer said the smell of alcohol grew stronger.

The officer also said Gonzalez, 34, cound not adequately perform the horizontal gaze test and that her eyes were bloodshot. He also said she slurred her speech and spoke haltingly when asked to count backward from 67 to 42, sometime repeating numbers or counting both forward and backward.

She told the offcer she had consumed one beer and a cocktail before getting into the wreck. A breath-testing device showed her blood-alcohol content at 0.164, more than twice the level to trigger a DWI charge.

Gonzalez, after leaving jail, posted a statement on her Facebook page saying that her "thoughts and prayers go out to the other persons involved."

The statement, since removed from the page, said that she not comment specifically about the arrested "until the legal matters have been resolved."

"I appreciate the support I have received from my family, my colleagues and my friends," said Gonzalez, an attorney in her private life. "I am committed to moving forward and continuing the important work of this legislative session."