HollyMatkinSherman, TX – Country music star Randy Travis’ 2012 drunk driving arrest came back to haunt him when the Texas Department of Public Safety released dashcam footage of the incident on Friday (video below).
Travis’ attorneys fought hard to keep the dashcam video of his arrest concealed from the public eye.
The video was only released on Nov. 30 after Travis’ final appeal was denied by the Federal District Court in Dallas, after a five-year legal battle between his legal team and media outlets, who filed freedom of information requests after the star was charged, KXII reported.
Travis was completely naked when officers first encountered him so the Texas attorney general redacted certain sections of the video prior to its release, according to the Charlotte Observer.
The incident captured on video began when the Grayson County Sheriff’s Office was called to a crash site at 11:18 p.m. on Aug 7, 2012, TMZ reported.
The caller reported there was a man lying in the roadway.
Officers at the scene determined that Travis had driven his 1998 Pontiac Trans Am off the road, and then he plowed it into several construction zone barricades.
No other vehicles were involved in the accident, and Travis suffered only minor injuries.
The full dashcam video of Travis’ arrest is three hours long. Shortened versions have appeared online.
In the video, Travis can be seen standing naked in front of a police vehicle.
Once inside the officer’s car, the officer asked Travis about the crash.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass,” Travis slurred.
He then went on to tell a story about being physically abused as a child, before unleashing vulgar and violent threats against the officer who transported him.
“You are dying, motherf****r,” Travis told the officer on the video.
“You insulted me by locking me up in a goddamned cage, basically, with handcuffs behind me with my d**k hanging out,” he complained.
“You got 60 rounds fully automatic coming at you,” Travis said in the video. “You f**k with me, you f**k with the wrong person, and I’m coming.”
He went on to tell the officer that he would bury him “under a barn.”
“I pray to God that he will have a cancerous growth that infects his bones and every part of his body,” Travis said.
“Is that directed toward me, Mr. Travis?” the officer asked.
“Yes it is,” Travis replied.
He then went on to say he was going to have the officer killed in 10 minutes, and bragged about knowing the head of “a mafioso” family.
Travis briefly tried to chew his way out of the seatbelt when he became impatient waiting for the officer to come around and unhook him, the video showed.
Investigators determined Travis had a blood-alcohol content of .21 at the time of his arrest.
Travis appeared in court on Jan. 31, 2013, and pleaded guilty to driving while intoxicated, Rolling Stone reported.
He received a six-month suspended sentence and two years of probation, as well as a $2,000 fine.
Travis was required to complete thirty days of inpatient chemical dependency treatment, and 100 hours of probation.
He was also mandated to have an ignition interlock device installed in his vehicle during the term of probation.
The device requires a driver to provide a breath sample before the vehicle will start, and it will not allow a vehicle to start if the sample indicates the operator has been drinking alcohol.
Prosecutors dismissed a charge of retaliation as part of Travis’ plea agreement, even though Travis repeatedly threatened to kill officers while he was being transported to jail.
After he was sentenced, Travis thanked supporters and the court, and acknowledged the police officers he said were “obviously taking care of me that night,” the Associated Press reported.
“Randy’s behavior was extremely altered the evening of his arrest due to the state of his mental health, and substances in his body, causing him to do and say things that were entirely out of character,” Travis’ publicist said, according to KXII. “He suffered a severe concussion and sustained numerous other injuries from the crash.”
“Randy Travis is well-known to be a loving, caring person who is respectful of everyone, a video that shows anything otherwise only underscores that he was absolutely not himself,” his publicist said. “Randy is deeply apologetic for his actions that evening.”
Just seven months after he was sentenced, the music legend suffered a debilitating stroke, which left him unable to speak. In July, Taste of Country reported that Travis was just learning to walk and speak again through intensive rehabilitation therapy.
Travis’ fans were upset the judge released the now five-year-old video of the country singer.
Watch portions of the 3-hour video of Travis’ arrest below: