Councilman Plans Guilty Plea to Drunk Driving Charge
City Councilman James D. Petrikin said Tuesday that he plans to plead guilty to drunk driving charges, but will remain in office.
Petrikin, 57, was arrested Nov. 4 in the Northern California city of Lodi on suspicion of driving while intoxicated. He will be arraigned Jan. 4 in Lodi Municipal Court.
“I have to assume that what they did was correct and, based on that, I am going to plead guilty,” Petrikin said. “I consider it very embarrassing. Thank God they stopped me or I could have hurt someone.”
Petrikin was driving from his ranch in Garden Valley to a City Council meeting here when a California Highway Patrol officer stopped him at 2:45 p.m.
Petrikin said Tuesday that he does not have a drinking problem but had consumed four or five beers during lunch to ease the pain from recent hip surgery.
“My hip was out, I was going to drive 500 miles, and there was a lot of pain,” Petrikin said. “This has never happened to me before.”
Petrikin apologized to his council colleagues for any embarrassment the incident may have caused them.
His third term in office ends in December 1999.
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