Louisiana Officer Gets Off after Drinking and Driving Police Car into Lake

A Louisiana police officer who crashed his police cruiser into a lake after a night of drinking has gotten off without being charged.

Officer Byron Boudreaux was reportedly taking a female passenger on a joy ride in his cruiser when he drove it into Louisiana State University Lakes in Baton Rouge, Louisiana at 1:43am on September 11, according to a report from 9News. Boudreaux was off duty at the time of the crash.

Sgt. Byron Fontenot, the reporting officer who arrived at the scene after Boudreaux called 911, wrote in his report that Boudreaux smelled of alcohol and had bloodshot eyes. Boudreaux allegedly told Fontenot that he had been out at a bar, gone home, met up with friends, and then decided to take a female for a joy ride when the accident happened.

After being taken to the police station for breath testing, Boudreaux allegedly refused to blow into a breathalyzer until more than two hours after the crash, when he blew a blood-alcohol level of .068. The legal limit in Louisiana is .08.

Since Boudreaux blew below the legal limit, he wasn't charged with DWI. However, a toxicologist told 9News that Boudreaux's blood-alcohol content at the time of the crash likely was somewhere around .10.

Reporters from 9News obtained tapes of Boudreaux's 911 dispatch call.

"I just had a, uh, single car (accident) involving my police unit," Boudreaux told the dispatcher. "I'm going to need a supervisor at the corner of East Lakeshore and Cedardale."

"Are you in the roadway?" the dispatcher asked.

"No ma'am. It's in the lake," Boudreaux said.

Follow Payton Guion on Twitter @PaytonGuion.