SAN ANTONIO – Newly obtained security video from the night of Councilman Clayton Perry’s drunken hit-and-run shows he drank more than San Antonio Police had originally tallied, and much more than his attorney argued in court last month.
In their affidavit for Perry’s DWI arrest warrant, San Antonio Police investigators wrote Perry drank 14 drinks in a four-hour period at a North Side bar on Nov. 6 before crashing his Jeep Wrangler into a Honda Civic waiting at the intersection of Redland Road and Jones Maltsberger.
During Perry’s Apr. 14 court hearing, his attorney, David Christian, said “after a careful review of the video” it was their contention Perry actually drank “about half that.”
But KSAT found police had actually under-counted what the District 10 councilman drank.
Christian had no comment when reached by phone Wednesday morning.
15+ drinks in 4 hours
KSAT obtained more than a dozen videos from the night of Perry’s crash through an open records request with the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office. The videos included Perry’s four hours at the Evil Olive, a bar in the 2900 block of Thousand Oaks, and his visit to a Bill Miller Bar-B-Q across the street.
In a review of the bar footage between Perry’s arrival at 4:46 p.m. and his departure at 8:49 p.m., KSAT counted the three-term councilman downing more than 15 drinks in all:
- 8 beers
- 6 shots
- 1 old fashioned
- the dregs of someone else’s drink
Police appear to have missed one of the beers in their tally for the arrest affidavit.
The detective listed 15 drinks in his final report. But his count included the remnants of a vodka drink that Perry consumed after his companion left it on the bar. When estimating Perry’s blood alcohol content, though, the investigator counted it as just half a drink.
Based on 14.5 drinks, the detective estimated Perry’s BAC to be about 0.2531 as he drove away from Evil Olive in his Jeep Wrangler - more than three times the legal limit of 0.08.
In either case, the video from outside the bar shows Perry stumbling as he leaves. Multiple staff members at the bar later told police Perry had not appeared drunk.
Drive-thru
The security video from the Bill Miller location shows Perry going through the drive-thru, where staff later told police he tried to take other people’s food, despite not having ordered anything himself.
The 17-year-old cashier told police that the 67-year-old councilman “just kept on saying, ‘I love you. I’m here just to see you.’”
Her manager told police Perry tried to hand over his keys and his wallet, too.
Perry left Bill Miller at 9:03 p.m., just a few minutes before his head-on crash less than a mile-and-a-half away.
Police find Perry in his backyard
Perry drove off after the crash and was lying in his back yard when an SAPD officer found him at 10:16 p.m.
Though he would later admit to causing the crash, Perry adamantly denied having driven while he talked with the officer that night.
With nothing to definitively put Perry behind the wheel, the officer left. After further police investigation, he ended up charged with two class B misdemeanors: failure to stop and give information and DWI.
Perry in court
Perry pleaded no contest to both charges on Apr. 14 in exchange for deferred adjudication. If he completes 12 months of probation, which includes not drinking alcohol, he will avoid being convicted.
County Court 6 Judge Erica Dominguez granted the deferred adjudication over the opposition of the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office. Prosecutors had made Perry a similar probation offer, but their deal would have required a conviction.
Despite prosecutors’ arguments that Perry’s cases were “egregious,” Dominguez said she did not think he should be on a “strict probation.”
The judge, who also oversees the Veterans Treatment Court, told Perry his position as a councilman got him “unfair options from the state” and that other defendants have gotten better deals.
The incident led directly to Perry deciding not to run for a fourth-and-final term in the May 6 election and he will leave office after Marc Whyte is sworn-in in June.
However, he has left the door open to future runs for office.
“I’m going to step aside while I’m going through this process. But, you know, who knows what the future will bring,” Perry told reporters after his Apr. 14 hearing.