Details of Matt Doheny’s BUI emerge

By Sam Foster
Via Adirondack Daily Enterprise

The curious race for NY's 23^rd congressional district has not been short on drama.  I reported last week that Republican candidate Matt Doheny had been detained for BWI in 2004.  The details turn out to be far more damaging.

First, Doheny's two incidents were within two weeks of each other.

Second, Mr. Doheny had become belligerent during his first incident and had to be handcuffed.  

Statements from the Coast Guard officers who boarded the vessel on July 10 say Doheny yelled at them and made threatening movements, questioned their authority to board the boat, refused to say whether he had been drinking but was stumbling and had slurred speech. He pulled away as they tried to handcuff him and was still combative when state police arrived on the scene. Doheny failed three of the seven field sobriety tests and then failed to take the breathalyzer correctly after several tries, not blowing enough air into it.

The second time, Doheny admitted to having drunk five beers and one vodka with Red Bull earlier, according to the officers' statements. Both boarding officers said he was cooperative. They brought Doheny onto the Coast Guard boat and docked Doheny's boat to allow his guests to disembark before conducting the field sobriety tests. Doheny also failed to blow into the breathalyzer hard enough after numerous tries, but ended up doing it and registering a blood alcohol content of .096.

Matt Doheny's past is going to be hard to swallow for voters sensitive about candidate misconduct as a result of ethics investigations of well-known NY congressman Charlie Rangel.