Off-duty NYPD lieutenant arrested for alleged drunk driving — again

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Off-duty NYPD lieutenant arrested for alleged drunk driving — again

Lt. Donald Stewart, 43, of the 100th precinct, was arrested for drunk driving and crashing into a parked car in Brooklyn on Saturday morning, mirroring his first arrest for a similar incident back …

nypost.com

Off-duty NYPD lieutenant arrested for alleged drunk driving — again​

By
Ronny Reyes


March 12, 2023 12:53pm
Updated

​

An off-duty NYPD lieutenant was arrested for drunk driving for a second time after he crashed into a parked car in Brooklyn over the weekend.
Lt. Donald Stewart, 43, a 22-year veteran of the force, was taken into custody at the 81st precinct Saturday at around 4:53 a.m. and charged with driving while impaired by alcohol, according to police.
He has been suspended without pay, an NYPD spokesperson said Sunday.
Officials declined to say where the crash happened, but the NYPD’s 81st precinct covers Stuyvesant Heights and parts of Crown Heights.
Stewart, a retired gunnery sergeant in the US Marine Corps Reserves, was previously arrested in 2014 after an investigation concluded he drove while “under the influence of an intoxicant” when he crashed into another parked car in Brooklyn.
According to police records, the first incident occurred on April 18, 2014, and Stewart was stopped by fellow officer James Nielson in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood.

Lt. Donald Stewart is a 22-year veteran of the force.Twitter/NYPD100pct
The police probe found that Stewart refused to take a breathalyzer test and “consumed an intoxicant to the extent that said officer was unfit for duty.”


Nielson testified that he didn’t think the then-sergeant was legally drunk.


He did, however, admit that he had a tough time deciding if Stewart was actually sober or not, but maintained that he did not show favoritism to his fellow officer.

Lt. Donald Stewart was arrested for drunk driving after crashing into a parked car.
“If he wasn’t a cop, I would have said that he was not above the legal limit,” Nielson told prosecutors, according to court papers.

Stewart was a gunnery sergeant in the US Marine Corps Reserves.
Stewart was ultimately acquitted of the 2014 DWI charge but was convicted of a traffic violation for leaving the scene of an incident.


Following the 2014 incident, Stewart was suspended for 64 days and put on probation for a year.





By 2018, Stewart rose in the ranks and currently serves as the 100th precinct’s special operations lieutenant. Records show his salary was $212,000 last year.


A representative of Stewart could not be immediately reached for comment.


Additional reporting by Tina Moore