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Driver Charged with DUI After Crash in Elementary School Parking Lot

Joshua Philip Starr | Pasco Sheriff | Arrests

He was dropping off a 7-year-old child at the school, Pasco deputies said.

WESLEY CHAPEL – A Wesley Chapel man was arrested Tuesday (Jan. 29) after he crashed into parking poles in the parking lot in front of Wiregrass Elementary School, according to the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office.

Joshua Philip Starr, 39, of Wesley Chapel was charged with one count each of Driving Under the Influence and Child Neglect. Deputies said he had a blood alcohol content of 0.239 and 0.248.

Deputies said they were called to the school, 29782 Wiregrass School Road, for a traffic crash. When they arrived, they said they found Starr dressed in a soiled bathrobe, sitting in the driver’s seat of a Cadillac CTS with his keys on the dashboard. His eyes were glassy and he spoke with slow, slurred speech.

School officials told deputies Starr had hit three traffic poles that separate the sidewalk from the paved lot.

Deputies said Starr told them he was dropping off a 7-year-old boy at the front door to the school. When he reached in the back to get a backpack, Starr said the car moved forward and hit the poles. Starr said he had taken a 1 mg. Xanax about an hour before but had had nothing to drink for the preceding 12 hours.

When he got out of the car, deputies said, Starr was unable to stand and swayed back and forth. He performed poorly on field sobriety tests.

A witness told deputies that Starr had been “walking into walls” at his house that morning. Starr also told the child he did not need to wear a seat belt because the school was close by. Deputies said that, when the car crashed into the poles, the boy was thrown forward and hit his head on the seat.

Pasco Sheriff | Crime | DUI | Arrests | Tampabay News

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