A former Aspen, Colorado bus driver who was taken off his bus last winter after supervisors suspected he was inebriated said Tuesday in court he did not consume alcohol before transporting bus passengers that night. But his lawyer said the man had eaten a marijuana cookie the night before and was likely still experiencing it.
Jeffory “Mudflap” Estes, who was later cited for DUI, told Pitkin County Judge Erin Fernandez-Ely he drank from a pint of 90-proof peppermint schnapps in his car Feb. 12 after Roaring Fork Transportation Authority supervisors removed him from the bus. “I proceeded to make a bad decision,” Estes said. “I knew I’d lost the best job I ever had.”
A RFTA supervisor told Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies after the incident that Estes, who was driving a bus between Aspen and Blue Lake, loaded passengers in the wrong spot at Rubey Park and his voice later sounded slurred on the radio, according to a sheriff’s report.
Estes, 46, left Rubey Park but was directed to stop at the RFTA maintenance yard at the Aspen Business Center.
RFTA officials asked Estes to go to Aspen Valley Hospital to have his blood drawn and tested, but he declined.
Estes said he declined the blood test because he knew he would test positive for marijuana, which would have caused RFTA to fire him under the agency’s zero-tolerance policies.
Read more of the story at AspenTimes.com.
