The Associated Press
CULPEPER, Va. — They weren’t charged with drunken driving, but police said two people now charged with public drunkenness did try to evade capture on horseback.
They were caught when one was knocked off his horse after riding into a utility wire and the other fell off her horse, police said.
On Saturday night, witnesses asked a man to stop urinating on the side of a convenience store because children were nearby, said Culpeper police Sgt. Scott Jenkins.
The man cursed those who complained, and after exiting the store, charged the group on his horse, witnesses said. One onlooker retreated behind a propane tank, Jenkins said.
When Officer Jeff Dodson arrived at the scene, witnesses told him the man and a woman had left on horseback, Jenkins said. Dodson caught up to them on a nearby street, but the riders fled through a backyard, he said. That was when they both fell off their horses.
They were charged with riding a horse on a highway after dark without proper reflective material, being drunk in public and obstruction of justice. The man also was charged with attempted unlawful wounding.
The man was held on a $2,500 bond, while the woman was released.
It wasn’t the riders’ first clash with the law. The two — again on horseback — were arrested this year on public drunkenness and railroad track trespassing charges. The woman paid a $25 fine and the man a $100 fine, according to court documents.