Police: Mom Drove Drunk

With Daughter In Backseat

ONEONTA – An Oneonta woman was arrested and charged with driving under the influence with her young daughter in the backseat, marking the first time the city has charged a driver under Leandra’s Law.

Ashley M. Stanton, 31, was arrested on Monday after police received reports that a woman appeared to be intoxicated while driving a vehicle with a small child.  She was stopped at the All-Star Car Wash in the East End.  Upon investigation, police claim Stanton had failed a field sobriety test, and believed she had taken medications and consumed alcohol in significant amounts to impair her driving, and that she had been driving with her young daughter  in the car.

According to Lt. Douglas Brenner, it’s the first case in the city that’s fallen under Leandra’s Law, a 2009 law that makes it an automatic felony to drive intoxicated with a person under 15 in the car.  The law was named for Leandra Rosado, an 11 year old who was killed after her friend’s mother, Carmen Huertas, who was allegedly under the influence of alcohol, flipped the car they were in on the Henry Hudson Parkway in October 2009.

Previously, Stanton had been arrested for driving while intoxicated, and her license was suspended at the time of this incident.  She was arrested and charged with the Class E felonies of driving while ability impaired by drugs with previous convictions, aggravated unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle in the first degree, and first degree aggravated driving while intoxicated with a child less than 15 years, as well as the Class A misdemeanor of endangering the welfare of a child.  If convicted of all charges, she faces 13 years incarceration.