contributed by Suzanne Smalley
Sidney Blumenthal plays hardball. A longtime confidante and adviser to the Clintons, he has zealously defended them through any number of scandal investigations. Along the way, Blumenthal has shown an affinity for the sharp counterattack. When a group of Arkansas state troopers in the early 1990s began leveling charges that Bill Clinton had strayed in his marriage, Blumenthal shot back--penning an article in The New Yorker accusing the troopers of a litany of their own transgressions, including attempted fraud, marital infidelity and drunken driving.
Now, Blumenthal himself faces charges of driving drunk. Blumenthal, an unpaid senior adviser to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, was arrested in Nashua on the eve of the New Hampshire primary and charged with aggravated DWI, according two members of the Nashua police force.
Sgt. Mike Masella, one of the arresting officers, said the movements of a Buick caught his eye. “I observed all his erratic driving,” Masella said. “When I first noticed him it was at an intersection. He abruptly stopped. That caught my eye … He was drifting in his lane.” Masella followed the car, a rental, for a mile and a half, and clocked its speed at 70mph in a 30mph zone--more than twice the legal limit. Masella pulled the car over at 12:30 a.m. Monday morning. Blumenthal told the officer he was returning to his hotel from a restaurant in Manchester. After declining to take a Breathalyzer, Masella says, Blumenthal failed a field sobriety test. Blumenthal was handcuffed, booked, had his fingerprints taken and was held for four hours--standard operating procedure in such arrests in New Hampshire--before posting bail and being released. (He will be arraigned later this month.) Because the car was moving at excessive speeds, Blumenthal was given the more serious charge of “aggravated” DWI--which carries a mandatory sentence of at least three days behind bars. “He’s charged with a serious crime,” says Nashua Police Capt. Peter Segal, who will oversee the case as it moves toward a court date.
Ray Mello, a New Hampshire attorney, says he is representing Blumenthal and will explore “all of the avenues of discovery.”
“In reality, it’s a traffic violation,” Mello said, noting that the more serious “aggravated” DWI charge is due to the alleged speeding, not “degree of intoxication.” When asked if Blumenthal was driving drunk, Mello said, “He’s going to pursue all legal defenses in court, and we’re going to deal with the case in court and not in the media.” (The Clinton campaign declined comment on the arrest and whether it would affect Blumenthal's status as an adviser.)
Blumenthal’s attorney could, of course, work out a plea agreement with prosecutors and spare his client jail time. Masella said that Blumenthal, a journalist and author currently working as a senior fellow for the New York University Center on Law and Security, was a gracious arrestee. “I asked if he was here with a campaign. He said he was here with Clinton," Masella said. “Other than that we certainly suspected him of DWI, he was a perfect gentleman."
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