Paul Pelosi was slurring his words and reeked of alcohol when arrested

Paul Pelosi was slurring his words and reeked of alcohol when he was picked up by cops after crashing his Porsche in May. Pelosi, 82, is due to be arraigned in Napa, California this morning – two months after he blew through a stop sign following a boozy dinner party, totaling his car and slamming into a Jeep.

He attempted to hand over a police courtesy card when asked for identification by cops. He also failed a field sobriety test and had a blood alcohol level of 0.82 percent, a complaint filed ahead of the hearing has revealed. 

The other driver, Jesus Lopez, 48, was lightly injured in the crash and complained of having pain in his upper right arm, right shoulder and back when seen by investigators the following day. He also said he was suffering from headaches. 

His wife, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was on official business in Rhode Island at the time and swiftly distanced herself from the incident. She met with Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen as her husband appeared in court. 

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In the new court document, obtained by the New York Post, officers said Pelosi also failed a field sobriety test and his eyes appeared ‘red and watery.’ It continued: ‘He was unsteady on his feet, his speech was slurred and he had a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage emanating from his breath.’ 

Pelosi was carted off to the Napa County Jail where he was booked at 12.32am and had a mugshot – that shows him shamefaced in a brown suit – taken shortly before he was released at 4.30am. Napa County DA Allison Haley spent weeks mulling whether to charge Pelosi – eventually deciding to hit him with one count of DUI causing injury and another of driving with .08 percent blood alcohol level or higher causing injury on June 23. 

The 82-year-old had been at a dinner with friends prior to the crash and was driving back to his palatial vineyard home in nearby St. Helena. At the time of the incident, he was attempting to cross State Road 29 – a busy highway that connects Napa and Calistoga – when he slammed into a 2014 Jeep driven by Jesus Lopez, 48. Both Lopez and Pelosi declined treatment at the scene.

Damage caused by the crash was still visible 48 hours after the accident, including a parking sign that had been knocked down and injury to the fence surrounding a vineyard. The dramatic new development comes after DailyMail.com revealed Pelosi has a history of driving incidents and was involved in a smash that killed his brother David when he was 16. 

According to a 1957 report in the San Francisco Examiner, Pelosi, who was then a high school sophomore, collected David, 19, from the home of a girlfriend at 12.30am and the brothers had decided to take a ‘joy ride.’ The fatal crash happened shortly after 2.40am close to the Crystal Springs Dam just outside of San Mateo and left David trapped under the car where he was throttled by his neck brace. Although a coroner’s jury later dismissed manslaughter charges against Pelosi, a patrolman quoted in contemporary news reports said David had told his brother to slow down seconds before the crash. 

He said: ‘This is a bad stretch – better slow down,’ as they approached a tight curve near the Crystal Springs Dam on the Skyline Highway, now California State Route 35 (pictured). Paul told Patrolman Thomas Ganley he tried to slow by shifting gears in the stick shift car, but lost control. ‘The car veered across the road, bounced back from a small embankment, climbed 20 feet up another, spun around and somersaulted simultaneously and ended upside down on the shoulder with both youths underneath,’ reported the Examiner. David, a freshman at the College of San Mateo, was dead on arrival at the hospital.