USA TODAY International Edition
Cop too drunk to collect MADD award
A Florida police officer who was due to be honored at a Mothers Against Drunk Driving conference turned up drunk to collect his award, according to local media.
So wasted, according to an internal affairs investigation, that he was found wandering in a hotel hallway stripped to his underwear.
Records obtained by two Tampa TV stations show that Michael Szeliga, a deputy from neighboring Pinellas County, packed a bottle of Jameson Irish whiskey in his patrol car before driving across the state to the Hyatt Regency Pier 66 Hotel in Fort Lauderdale with two other deputies.
They were there in July for two days of training to combat drunken driving. Szeliga was also supposed to receive a MADD decoration for making more than 100 DUI arrests, WFLA reported.
The 274- page report detailed how a local police chief, Robert Vincent, encountered Szeliga outside the banquet and suggested it wasn’t appropriate for him to attend because of his intoxication. That led to “disrespectful” comments, which prompted Vincent, who commands the Gulfport police, to tell one of Szeliga’s supervisors that the deputy was “wasted.”
Szeliga’s supervisor, according to the investigation seen by WFLA, said he smelled alcohol on Szeliga’s breath and ordered him to return to his room and miss the banquet — and his award.
According to the document, Szeliga signed in and attended a morning session of the DUI training but left with two other deputies following the first break, having decided it was no longer “relevant” to him since he was transferring to the child- protection unit. This despite the fact that MADD re- quired attendance at all training in exchange for picking up expenses.
As evening approached, the report continued, a sergeant who runs the DUI squad in neighboring Pasco County reported seeing Szeliga in the hotel hallway, drunk and wearing “nothing but boxer shorts.”
The Pasco sergeant told investigators Szeliga’s eyes were glassy and his speech was slurred. However, Szeliga denied being intoxicated and said that he had only consumed two or three drinks that he poured from the Jameson bottle in his room.