Associated Press
BUTTE, Mont. -- A Montana justice of the peace recently appointed to help oversee a new DUI court has been charged with driving under the influence of drugs.
An assistant attorney general filed the misdemeanor DUI charge Thursday against Robert E. Lee, a retired Butte police officer.
Lee is charged with driving to the Butte-Silver Bow County Courthouse on Nov. 13 while under the influence of methadone, a synthetic narcotic used to relieve pain or prevent withdrawal symptoms from drug addiction.
He was knocking on the window of the police station that Saturday morning asking officers to let him into the courthouse because he had a wedding to perform, police said. Lee appeared confused and under the influence of alcohol or drugs, officers said.
The officers said Lee told them he drove to the courthouse and police found his vehicle parked in a handicapped zone. Court records said his driver’s license and some credit cards were found on the ground outside the courthouse.
Lee performed poorly on a field sobriety test, police said. A blood test confirmed the presence of methadone.
Lee told officers he was on lorazepam, an anti-anxiety medication. His wife told investigators that Lee was taking lorazepam to get off methadone.
Officers searched Lee’s vehicle and found a methadone tablet. At his house, officers were shown an empty bottle of methadone. The 60-tablet prescription had been filled nine days earlier.
Lee told KXLF-TV he was confident he would be vindicated. He also said he believed he would be allowed to remain on the bench, since the charge was a misdemeanor.
It’s not clear why he was charged five months after the reported violation. The county attorney denied a records request from The Montana Standard in December based on an item on the police dispatch log. County commissioners asked the state to help prosecute the case late last month.