According to a Catoosa County Sheriff’s Office incident report, June 11th, 2023, 12:11 AM, CPL Thomas was on patrol traveling north on Alabama Highway. According to the report, “As he was driving by the Mapco at Holcomb Road he saw a Dodge flatbed pickup leaving the lot with the passenger side headlight out. CPL Thomas made a u-turn and got behind the vehicle and saw that as he pulled out of the Mapco parking lot he went all the way over to the right and crossed the fog line. As he continued past the clinic just south of Holcomb the offender ran over the fog line again with his right rear tires leaving the roadway. CPL Thomas continued to follow the vehicle waiting for a safe place for them to stop and observed the vehicle cross the fog line and the center line multiple times with the right side tires crossing completely over the lines.” The deputy conducted a traffic stop and made contact with the driver, Jesse Alexander Tatum, 34. When the deputy made contact, he could immediately smell an odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from the offender and could see his eyes were red and watery. Corporal Thomas also observed a child in the backseat. Tatum said that it was his 5-year-old son. According to the report, “Corporal Thomas asked Tatum how much he’d had to drink and he said he’d only had a drink earlier. During field sobriety testing, Tatum showed several signs of impairment and a BAC of .082 on a PBT. Tatum’s wife responded to pick up their son. Tatum was transported to the Catoosa County Jail, where he showed a BAC of .136 on the state test. Tatum was charged with DUI, DUI child endangerment and failure to maintain lane.
Man arrested after driving drunk all over the roadway with 5-year-old son in Catoosa County
