NEWS
Woman drives with man on hood
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by Heather Quitos
Monday, March 20, 2006
Madison police arrested Wisconsin resident Ursula Ahrens, 25, after she allegedly drove a car with a man on top of the hood March 10 near East Washington Avenue.
Ahrens was charged with second-degree reckless endangerment and operating while intoxicated.
According to a police report, the incident occurred shortly before 3 a.m., when David Minihan, 22, of Madison, was almost hit by Ahrens' car. Despite repeated attempts to stop Ahrens from driving, Minihan, who was Ahrens' designated driver for the evening, could not stop Ahrens from getting into her car.
Even though Minihan was on top of the car, Ahrens continued to drive out of the parking lot the two had been arguing in.
"[Ahrens] started her car and [Minihan] stood in front of her and he continued to plead with her not to drive," said MPD Public Information Officer Tony Fiore. "She started inching forward toward him, so he had crawled on top of the hood to get out of the way and convince her not to drive."
Ahrens drove about one-fifth of a mile down the street with Minihan on top of the vehicle, hanging onto the vehicle for his own personal safety because Ahrens had reached a speed of nearly 30 mph.
The report states Ahrens was forced to slow down for cross traffic on East Washington Avenue.
"This presented an opportunity for Minihan to jump safely from the hood of the car … and to contact the Madison Police Department to report the matter," the report states.
Fiore said Ahrens and Minihan had been out earlier in the evening. Fiore said Ahrens wanted to drive to another location after spending time at Minihan's residence, but Minihan felt Ahrens was in no condition to drive.
Fiore said he hopes people will try to contact the police in extreme situations similar to this one.
"We hope that if someone was the designated driver, he did everything he could to encourage her not to drive," he said. "If someone has the keys of their car and they are determined to drive, we don't want people to put themselves in danger."
Anonymous (March 20, 2006 @ 3:46pm):
So this super-determined designated driver guy didn't want to physically stop the woman from getting into the drivers seat of the car (or take away the keys, etc), but was willing to stand infront of the car with the drunk woman behind the wheel, and then crawl on to the hood? Something is fishy about this story. I doubt the woman was the only one drunk in this situation.
Anonymous (April 2, 2006 @ 2:58pm):
It is amazing how stories can be turned around so much in some cases. I know that this is what has been reported as what happened, but I really do feel that most of this information is inaccurate.
