Shortly before 2 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 28, a police officer watching traffic on the Post Road clocked a car at 53 mph, driven by an intoxicated man who failed to stop for a red light before he turned onto a side street, police said.
Darien police gave this further account (with accusations not proven in court):
The officer was parked at the intersection of Purdy Lane and the Post Road when he saw the 2000 gray Honda Civic traveling west toward Stamford. The speed limit for the Post Road there is 35 mph.
The car drove into Stamford with the police officer in pursuit. The Honda didn’t stop for a red light before turning from Route 1 (which is East Main Street in Stamford) onto Hamilton Avenue or Brookside Drive in Stamford (maps differ over whether Brookside in Stamford extends to Route 1; the driver may have traveled north a bit on Hamilton Avenue and then turned right onto nearby Brookside Drive).
(Stamford’s Brookside Drive, believe it or not, is only a block away from Darien’s Brookside Drive — the two streets otherwise have nothing in common but the brook, Noroton “River,” that apparently gives them their name. The resulting confusion, spanning generations, can only be imagined. Then there’s a Brookside Road in Darien, as well.)
The driver, a resident of a nearby street in Stamford, at first told police he had just come from a pharmacy in Darien with medicine for his mother. The police officer found the man’s speech was slurred and his eyes were glassy and red. The odor of alcohol came from the vehicle after the window had been rolled down.
The officer asked the man to step out of the car. When the driver did, he appeared unsteady on his feet and the officer could smell alcohol on him. The driver didn’t pass the three field sobriety tests he was given.
Asked how much he had to drink, the driver responded by saying he only lived a block way, and repeated that several times while talking with the officer. Eventually, the driver said he had been drinking at Ernie’s bar in downtown Darien.
The man was charged with driving while under the influence. A police officer delivered the medication to the man’s mother. She later picked him up at the police station at about 4 p.m.