Felony DWI charges are on the rise in Anoka County

While felony charges for impaired driving are dropping statewide, Anoka County law enforcement officials have found themselves bucking that trend.

During a one-month period starting in early April, they got five alleged felony-level repeat drunken drivers off the road. If that rate continued for the rest of the year, the county would double the total of 31 people charged with felony impaired driving last year.

"It is a high number for one month, but I can't explain why it happened," said Assistant County Attorney Jessica Rugani, who prosecutes many of these cases.

To be charged with felony impaired driving, an offender must have four impaired-driving arrests within 10 years. The law creating the felony, which took effect in August 2002, is a proven deterrent, said Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman. The number of drunken-driving offenders falls off dramatically after the fourth offense, he said.

"I think the message finally kicks in because it is a felony with a mandatory minimum six-month sentence," he said.

Still, a lot of people don't seem to be getting the message. At least 4,400 drivers have been sentenced under the felony statute, but the number of people with a second felony DWI has increased each year since the statute was created. There were 156 in 2008, or 20 percent of all felony DWI convictions.

Hennepin County charged 128 people with felony impaired driving last year, less than half the number from 2003. Ramsey County has had 25 such arrests this year. What is interesting to Freeman is the typical profile of a felony-level drunken driver, based on statistics from the state's sentencing guideline commission: a white male, mid-30s who lives outside the metro area.

Each person's last DWI was less than three years ago, and all but one refused an officer's request to consent to a blood-alcohol test.

The reason law enforcement was able to nab such a high number in one month is unclear, but Lt. Shelly Orlando of the Anoka County Sheriff's Office said a recent decline in overall calls for service allows deputies more time to do proactive policing. Because many officers participate in the county's successful drunken-driving task force on weekends, they are more attuned to the signs of drunken driving, she said.

"To get that many in jail is very significant," she said.

Among Minnesota counties with populations of at least 100,000, Anoka and Ramsey posted the largest declines in alcohol-related crashes from 2000 to 2008, according to a Star Tribune analysis. Beyond the task force, county officials said intensive repeat-offender programs contributed to the reduction.

The first of the five Anoka County arrests was made April 3 in Coon Rapids. Police received a call that Gabriel Ayres, 34, was harassing a former neighbor. He left as police arrived.

Five days later Annette Jerger, 49, was stopped in Coon Rapids after she hit a car in the parking lot of her hair salon about 10 a.m. A preliminary blood-alcohol test result was 0.27, more than three times the legal limit to drive, the court document said. She was booked into jail before noon.

Arrestee No. 3, 49-year-old Tina M. Martinez, failed a variety of sobriety tests when she was stopped in Andover April 11, the criminal complaint said. In the complaint, the Anoka County deputy said she drove at a very slow speed, crossed the center line and had no taillights. Her driver's license was suspended in 2008, and the deputy said her blood-alcohol level was 0.23, the complaint said. She has drunken-driving offenses going back to 2002.

Officers didn't come across the next driver until 2 a.m. May 5 in the parking lot of a convenience store in Centennial Lakes. The officer, for safety reasons, patted down Drew Swanson and found a stiletto knife, the complaint said. Swanson was fidgety and sweating profusely, despite it being 48 degrees, the complaint said.

Before Swanson's car was towed, the officer searched it and found a .25-caliber automatic handgun with a loaded magazine. Swanson didn't have a permit to carry a handgun, the complaint said. Swanson, 49, declined to be tested for alcohol and drugs, saying the test was "a little intrusive," the complaint said.

The last person, Michael LaFaurie, wasn't drunk but was arrested for having buprenorphine in his system, the complaint said. He told an Anoka County sheriff's deputy he was taking the controlled substance for withdrawals from opiates. He had been charged with a DWI on three other occasions.