Ice Cream Truck Driver Charged With DUI

Police say they found a nearly empty pint bottle of vodka between the front seats of an ice cream truck after they pulled over the driver for swerving into the wrong lane.

Goshen Police Patrolman Jared Baer spotted the yellow-and-white van in a subdivision, after several motorists called Saturday to report the swerving vehicle in the city about 25 miles southeast of South Bend, police said.

The van was stopped, and the driver was selling ice cream to children, so Baer waited until Dennis D. Cogburn, 51, of Bowie, Texas, started up again.

Baer said he followed the van and pulled it over after Cogburn failed to signal turns and swerved into the wrong lane.

Cogburn failed field sobriety tests and was arrested on a preliminary charge of driving under the influence of alcohol.

Cogburn reported having chest pains, so he was taken to a hospital, where a test showed his blood-alcohol level was 0.24 percent, three times the state's legal level to drive a car.

Baer impounded the ice cream van and found the nearly empty bottle of vodka, he reported.

Cogburn told police he's staying in a South Bend motel, working for the ice cream company, but planned to move back to Texas soon.

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