Video shows Michigan Rep. Mary Cavanagh's suspected drunken driving arrest in Livonia
LIVONIA, Mich. (FOX 2) - Body cam video from Livonia police shows Michigan Rep. Mary Cavanagh's arrest after she was pulled over for swerving and driving on flat tires.
Cavanagh (D-Redford) is now facing an operating while intoxicated charge stemming from the Feb. 25 arrest.
A Livonia officer followed Cavanagh onto I-96 from Merriman after realizing her vehicle had two flat tires around 2 a.m. According to a police report, Cavanagh was swerving on the freeway.
After her driver's side tire disconnected from the rim, she exited the freeway at Middlebelt by cutting across the gore, which is the triangular area located in between the lanes of a highway and the exit. She then put her hazards on, so the officer stopped her.
When the officer told her about the flat tires, she said, "That's not great," and told the officer that it was recent. She wasn't sure what happened to the tires.
"I was in the middle of calling my boyfriend for help," she said.
Cavanagh told the officer she was coming from Lansing, then said she had stopped at a fundraiser for another state representative in Westland, so the officer questioned how much she had to drink.
She told him two glasses of red wine. She also told the officer she drinks once a week when asked if she drinks a lot.
"State representative, I try not to do a lot in Lansing," Cavanagh told the officer.
Cavanagh, who has a previous drinking and driving conviction from 2015, struggled through field sobriety tests.
When the officer took her to the patrol vehicle, and she found out she was being arrested, she initially declined to take a preliminary breath test.
Rep. Mary Cavanagh (Photo: Michigan House of Democrats)
"I know I only had one drink and I don't want it to be used against me at this point," she told the officer. "I'm just worried. I didn't feel like I was in any trouble, and now I'm in the back."
She eventually submitted to the breath test and blew a .17, double the legal limit.
"At the end of the day, am I spending the night in jail?" Cavanagh said after the breath test. "I've done this before. I even have a record. I'm a good person."
When the officer asked her to put her hands behind her back, she questioned him.
"At the end of the day, do you need to cuff me from the back?" she said.
Canvanagh asked if she could be handcuffed in the front. When the officer told her no, she questioned him but complied.
"I don't understand what I did," she said.
Cavanagh was taken to jail, where a police report shows that she blew a .20.
She appeared in court Wednesday, and is due back in court April 21.
"My client takes this very seriously as a public servant. It's important that we all be responsible in our actions and to take accountability for ourselves, her attorney, Todd Perkins, said.