About eight months after he was arrested under suspicion of drunken driving on MSU’s campus, Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Higher Education Bob Genetski will face a jury Monday morning.
State Rep. Genetski, R-Saugatuck, will appear in front of East Lansing’s 54-B District Court Judge David Jordan for a jury trial to determine if he was drunk the morning of Jan. 19 while driving down Michigan Avenue in East Lansing and if he illegally refused to take a Breathalyzer test.
Genetski was arrested en route to his hotel room after watching Gov. Rick Snyder’s State of the State address. MSU police initially pulled him over for speeding on Michigan Avenue near Beal Street; Genetski admitted to police he drank two beers before driving.
During the stop, he refused to take a Breathalyzer test and was taken to the Ingham County Jail under suspicion of drunken driving. After being processed in the jail, the politician blew a .066, which is .014 under the legal limit, according to police.
If convicted of drunken driving, Genetski could face a 93-day jail penalty, his attorney Mike Nichols said in a previous interview.
Refusing to take a Breathalyzer test is punishable with a one-year license suspension.
In an interview Sunday, Nichols said he wants to take the case before a jury because the prosecution “didn’t make an offer to Bob to resolve the case in a way that made it worthwhile for him to give up his constitutional rights.”
Since April, Genetski has been driving with a restricted license, only permitting him to drive to and from work and court dates, Nichols said.
Last spring, Genetski led a House committee that was influential in determining higher education funding, including state funding to MSU. Some critics have said remaining the committee’s chairman while facing charges of drunken driving on a college campus could be a conflict of interest for Genetski. But he and Speaker of the House Jase Bolger, R-Marshall, have maintained his charges in no way influenced his work.
As Nichols prepares for court Monday, he said he has worked to obtain all of the evidence from the incident, although he previously had concerns that there was a missing video tape police were not sharing.
MSU police released a video about 30 minutes long of footage from the incident.
“They tell me they’ve given me everything they have,” Nichols said.
In a statement issued after his arrest in January, Genetski described being arrested as “one of the most humbling and eye-opening experiences” of his life.
“At no time did I feel my driving ability was impaired,” Genetski said in the statement. “That is a serious thing every driver needs to consider, and they should make the choice to not get behind the wheel if there is the slightest doubt.”
Genetski has no prior record of driving incidents other than speeding tickets.
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