Paul Pelosi Handed Sentence For DUI Case

Paul Pelosi managed to avoid more jail time regarding drunk driving charges back in May. After pleading guilty only to driving under the influence and causing injury, he was sentenced to only five days in jail and ordered to pay $6,800 in fines.

However, Paul Pelosi avoided extra jail time as the judge gave him four days’ credit for time already served in jail following his arrest. Judge Joseph Solga noted that he had served two from actual time served and two for conduct credits.

According to his attorney Amanda Bevins, the judge ordered him to perform eight hours of community service in place of the one remaining day. 

The sentence includes a three-month drunk driving program, restitution payments, and three years of probation. He was also forbidden to operate a motor vehicle for a year unless it was equipped with a DUI ignition device. The device prevents the driver from starting the car before providing an instant alcohol-free breath sample.

Paul Pelosi also was ordered to pay $4,927 in restitution to the driver of the other car for medical bills and lost wages. In addition, he is to pay the standard restitution fee of $150 and a $1,723 court fine.

The DA’s office also added that the state Department of Motor Vehicles could also suspend Paul Pelosi’s driver’s license for a year based on his conviction.

Court documents also show that Pelosi had given the responding officers a pro-police charity membership card when he was pulled over. He belongs to the California Highway Patrol 11-99 (CHP 11-99) Foundation, but the organization is reviewing his membership following this development.

He was arraigned on misdemeanor charges in a case that should begin with felony bookings. However, he was ‘cite released’ from the corrections custody and free of his own recognizance. Pelosi chose not to appear in Court, but his attorney, Amanda Bevins, had appeared on his behalf in a Napa County, California, court.

Bevins entered the guilty plea on his behalf after he had initially pleaded not guilty to two charges earlier this month. He allegedly hit another vehicle while driving drunk on May 28. Following this, his Porsche and the other driver’s Jeep sustained “major collision damage” in the crash. 

Under an agreement reached on Tuesday, the judge accepted Paul Pelosi’s guilty plea to a single misdemeanor count of DUI causing injury. 

The judge dismissed the second charge of Pelosi driving with a blood-alcohol level higher than the state’s legal limit and causing injury. Unlike the misdemeanor charge he pleaded guilty to, this charge carries a maximum penalty of a year in jail and five years probation. 

His wife, Nancy Pelosi, was in Rhode Island at the time of the incident to deliver a commencement address at Brown University. She has also refused to comment on her husband’s arrest, with her office referring to it as a “private matter.”