Affidavit: Police sergeant charged with DWI refused field sobriety test three times
El Paso Police officers arrested an off-duty police sergeant early Friday morning after she was allegedly speeding while driving drunk.
Police charged Jessica Grijalva, 36, with Driving While Intoxicated. A criminal complaint obtained by ABC-7 states Grijalva’s blood alcohol concentration level “was .15 or more,” which would put her at or nearly twice the legal limit of .08.
Pebble Hills Regional command officers pulled Grijalva over on the 1300 block of George Dieter near Rojas after they noticed she was speeding while driving a 2019 Honda Civic.
Police said the radar clocked Grijalva’s Civic in at 61 miles per hour on a 40 miles per hour zone. The officers made a u-turn and followed the Civic, but “the vehicle continued speeding down the 1300 block of George Dieter and failed to maintain lanes,” the criminal complaint states.
The officers then activated the patrol unit’s emergency lights and signaled for Grijalva to stop.
According to the criminal complaint, Grijalva “had a delayed response to the activation of the emergency lights and continued south on George Dieter so (the officers) turned on the takedowns and shined a spotlight on the (Civic),” the criminal complaint states.
Grijalva eventually stopped at a red light at George Dieter and Rojas before turning “too left wide into the right hand lane before stopping in a Wells Fargo parking lot,” the court document states.
When officers approached the Civic and Grijalva rolled down her window, the officers “immediately smell a strong odor of an unknown alcoholic beverage coming from the breath and person of the defendant,” the document states.
When asked where she was coming from, Grijalva allegedly told the officer “out.” When asked if she had anything to drink, Grijalva allegedly said “nothing.”
When asked to step out of the vehicle, Grijalva was “reluctant to do so,” the criminal complaint states.
Grijalva eventually “opened her door and slowly stepped out,” the document states, adding the officers then “observed the defendant appeared to be off balance and had to lean against the car to balance herself.”
The police officers noticed Grijalva had bloodshot eyes and slurring her words, the criminal complaint states.
Grijalva allegedly refused to perform a field sobriety test “despite three requests to do so,” the criminal complaint states. She eventually consented to providing a breath specimen, police said, adding “the defendant provided a breath specimen of .182 at 2:07 a.m. and .190 at 2:10 a.m.”
Grijalva is a police sergeant assigned to the Pebble Hills Regional Command Center. She was booked into the El Paso County Detention Facility under a $750 bond.
The Department’s Internal Affairs unit is conducting an investigation. The officer was relieved of duty, police said in a news release.
