A drunk driving suspect was arrested after leaving the scene of an accident in Leesburg.
Leesburg police officers responded Wednesday evening to the accident scene on U.S. Hwy. 441 at North Lake Avenue where they found a car that had been rear-ended by a grey Hyundai. The driver of the damaged car gave the officers a license plate number which came back as belonging to a gold van. That witness said the driver of the grey Hyundai had driven north on U.S. Hwy. 441.
An officer stopped the grey Hyundai a short distance away from the accident scene. The driver was identified as 32-year-old Stephan Ragin of Umatilla. The officer saw a bottle of Paul Mason brandy on the driver’s side floorboards. A strong odor of alcohol was detected coming from Ragin. His words were so slurred that the officer could not understand what Ragin was saying when he was asked about the accident, according to the arrest report.
Ragin was unable to complete standardized field sobriety exercises. He provided two breath samples registering .390 and .397 blood alcohol content, more than four times the legal limit. While Ragin was at the police station a witness to the accident gave the police a video he had taken showing Ragin’s erratic behavior. It also showed the crash.
Ragin was booked at the Lake County Jail on charges of driving under the influence, leaving the scene of an accident and having a tag not assigned to the vehicle. Bond was set at $5,000.
