Tipsy teacher with BAC over twice the legal limit not facing charges: ‘Not illegal to teach drunk’
A second-grade teacher who was arrested in California for being drunk in class is no longer facing charges — because prosecutors concluded “it is not illegal to teach drunk.”
Wendy Munson’s blood-alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit when she was nabbed midway through teaching students at Nuestro Elementary School, north of Sacramento, last October.
But after months of probing the incident, the Sutter County District Attorney’s Office finally revealed Monday that it hasn’t found any charges that’ll stick.
“It is not illegal to teach drunk,” Jennifer Dupre, the district attorney, told NBC15.
“While the District Attorney’s Office agrees that it is highly inappropriate to teach while intoxicated, it is, unfortunately, not illegal,” her office also said in announcing the decision.
The teacher was cuffed and hauled away when Sutter County sheriff’s deputies showed up to her classroom just before 8:30 a.m. Oct. 2 after a co-worker had raised suspicions that she was intoxicated.
Munson later failed a sobriety test and her blood-alcohol level was still twice the legal limit some two hours after her arrest, the sheriff’s office said at the time.
She was subsequently charged with drunk driving, drunk driving with a BAC of 0.08% or higher, and child abuse with the possibility of great bodily injury.
Despite authorities saying there was surveillance footage that captured her driving to school in an inebriated state, the DA said that was difficult to actually prove.
“There was the possibility that she drank after she arrived at the school,” Dupre said.
The district attorney added it was also difficult to enforce child endangerment laws because prosecutors would have to have proven that Munson “would” harm the kids, rather than she “may” have harmed them.
“We couldn’t prove that her intoxication would endanger them,” Dupre said.
“We tried because I don’t like the conduct. It’s not acceptable, but it’s unfortunately not criminal,” she added.
At the time of the incident, the Nuestro Elementary School District superintendent, Baljinder Dhillon, had informed parents that Munson was immediately escorted from the campus in the wake of her arrest.
She is no longer listed as a teacher on the school’s website, though it wasn’t immediately clear if she faced disciplinary action over her drunken antics.
The DA’s office noted that its “position regarding criminal charges does not impact any decisions or discipline to be made” by the school district “regarding the employment status of Munson.”
