Cops: drunk driver called OnStar for help

COSSAYUNA, NY — Fifty-three-year-old Gary Kietlinski of Cossayuna is facing an aggravated drunk driving charge after police say he used the OnStar device in his pick-up truck to call for help a little after 2:00 a.m. on Sunday.

In a recording released by the Cambridge-Greenwich Police Department, a caller police say is Kietlinski says, “I just can’t drive my truck home.  You can see.  I’m on a back road here going to Cossayuna.  I could do it but I really don’t want to.”

The caller then tells an emergency dispatcher, “I’m a little under the influence.”

Kietlinski allegedly called OnStar and was patched through to a Washington County emergency dispatcher after finding graffiti on his truck.

The dispatcher asks if someone has vandalized the caller’s vehicle.

The called responds, “Well, I don’t know correctly.  I looked at the outside of the truck but somebody did something.  You’ll see it when you get here.”

When police got to the corner of Gray Avenue and Highland Street in Greenwich, they say they found Kietlinski parked right in the middle of the road.

Cambridge-Greenwich Police Chief George Bell explains:  ”Stopped in the middle of the road with his four-way flashers on and pushed the OnStar button in his truck.”

Chief Bell says, after an officer arrived, Kietlinski called OnStar for a second time.

Police say Kietlinski was inside his vehicle with the doors closed and locked.

He allegedly couldn’t figure out how to open the doors so he wanted OnStar to unlock them remotely.

Chief Bell tells us, “They just politely told him over the OnStar network how to get out of the car without them remotely unlocking it.”

No one answered the door at Kietlinkski’s home on Monday night.

Chief Bell says this was the explanation he offered to police:  ”He was too drunk.  He just kept reiterating the fact to my officers while they were processing him that he had to call for help because he was too drunk to drive.”

Kietlinski is facing an aggravated DWI charge because police say his blood-alcohol level was 0.19 – more than twice the legal limit.

He’s due back in court in November.

Read the story here.

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