NJ Police Chief Arrested For DUI After Being Found With Pants Down In The Street

Mercer County, NJ – Authorities have released bodycam video of the April drunk driving arrest of Bordentown Police Chief Brian Pesce, who was found lying in the road with his pants down (video below).

The incident occurred just after 8:30 p.m. on April 22 after a driver called 911 and reported a red Chevy Silverado that was “weaving all over the place” and had almost hit a mailbox, NJ.com reported.

“He’s gonna kill somebody,” the caller told the dispatcher.

The woman called 911 back a few minutes later and reported that the driver she thought was “drunk” had parked on Bruin Drive, NJ.com reported.

“He’s on the ground in the middle of the road, can’t get up… now he’s leaning on his car,” she said. “He’s so obliviated.”

Bodycam video showed that when officers arrived on the scene, they found a man later identified as Chief Pesce lying on the pavement behind a red pickup truck.

Officers found the man’s cell phone and car keys lying in the middle of the street, the video showed.

One of the officers tried asking the downed man questions such as his age but he wasn’t able to answer, so the officer radioed dispatch and requested an ambulance on the scene.

“I took a little spill,” the man on the ground told them.

An officer walked over and looked at Chief Pesce’s truck, the video showed.

“What the f-k is that? He pissed on his tire and then ‘took a spill?’” the officer asked.

“What’s the problem?” the allegedly drunk man on the ground asked when the officers asked him for his name.

“You’re sleeping in the middle of the road,” one officer replied.

“Your pants are down,” the other officer added.

“Are you diabetic?” an officer asked the man.

“Not at all,” Chief Pesce replied.

“Probably the wrong answer,” the officer said.

The officers told Chief Pesce that he appeared to have a head wound and that he may have thrown up so they wanted to him to be checked out by paramedics.

The video showed the officers tried to get into the man’s cell phone to call his wife but he was unable to provide the passcode.

So one of the officers went back to Chief Pesce’s pickup truck and searched for the man’s wallet.

He found the police chief’s law enforcement credentials and badge in the side pocket of the driver’s door, the video showed.

“Ohh,” the officer sighed audibly when he saw Chief Pesce’s identification.

They he motioned to his partner and both of the officers turned off their bodycams, NJ.com reported.

They turned their bodycams back on but their tone had changed, NJ.com reported.

As more and more officers arrived on the scene, one of the officers in the video referred to the man being put into the ambulance as “chief.”

The police chief told responding officers that he hadn’t been driving and at least one bodycam video showed that at some point, he claimed that a friend had dropped him off at his vehicle, NJ.com reported.

Police called the chief’s wife and reached out to the 911 caller who confirmed to officers that she had seen the man on the ground get out of the driver’s side of the truck when it stopped.

Officers informed Chief Pesce that he was being arrested for driving while intoxicated and the chief continued to deny he had been driving and appeared bewildered by the questions.

“I drove?” he asked in the video.

“Who was driving?” the officer asked the chief.

“No one was driving,” Chief Pesce insisted.

The video later showed two officers discussing whether they should put handcuffs on the police chief, NJ.com reported.

“It’s up to you,” one of the officers said. “Like everybody else. I’ll do it, I’ll be the one… just like everybody else.”

The video showed the other officer reached for his handcuffs, NJ.com reported.

The video showed one of the EMTs told an officer that the patient “admitted” drinking.

The police chief told officers he had been drinking “10 hours earlier,” NJ.com reported.

“There’s no black and white, there’s all jumbled pieces,” an officer said in the video.

Hamilton police requested their department’s internal affairs unit be notified of the incident, NJ.com reported.

The police report said that Chief Pesce had struck a mailbox on Deacon Drive with his vehicle and kept going.

The police chief’s blood was drawn at the hospital, NJ.com reported.

He was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated, reckless and careless driving, and leaving the scene of an accident.

Chief Pesce became police chief of Bordentown Township after his predecessor, former Bordentown Township Police Chief Frank Nucera was charged with federal hate crimes in 2017.

When he was a police captain, he initiated the charges against then-Chief Nucera, NJ.com reported.

Chief Pesce initiated numerous police department reforms when he took the helm.

The 23-year-veteran of the police force was placed on restricted duty after his arrest, NJ.com reported.

Watch the incident unfold in the video below: