Walton seeks DWI record erasure

Wal-Mart heiress asks that Texas arrest case be expunged

Wal-Mart heiress Alice Walton has asked for her DWI arrest record in Texas to be expunged.

It’s a common request after charges have been dropped in a misdemeanor case, said Fred Barker, an assistant prosecutor in Parker County, Texas, where Walton was arrested on an accusation of driving while intoxicated Oct. 7, 2011.

Barker said Walton “probably has justification.”

“The case is not that credible, which is probably a reason it was laying around fora while,” he said.

Barker wouldn’t elaborate on the credibility of the case, but he said that a month from now, there may be no record of the arrest ever occurring in Weatherford, Texas.

Walton’s request will likely be granted because charges were never filed and the statute of limitations has run out, Barker said.

If an expunction order is issued by the Parker County District Court, Barker said the records will be destroyed.

“It will cease to exist for us in any way - literally,” Barker wrote in a letter to a reporter. “We would not even acknowledge it ever existed nor that it was expunged, or that we ever talked to you about it.”

“There’s really no way to stop it,” he said in a telephone interview. “Once that’s done, it’s gone, gone, gone.”

A two-year statute of limitations ran out on Walton’s case Oct. 7. Prosecutor John Forrest said he didn’t pursue the charge against Walton because the state trooper who arrested her was unavailable to testify in court.

Trooper Jeffrey Davis of the Texas Highway Patrol was suspended in February pending the outcome of an internal investigation involving misconduct allegations, rendering him unavailable to help in the prosecution.

Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman Tom Vinger said Friday that the internal inquiry was ongoing and that Davis remained suspended.

Walton’s arrest occurred a month before the opening of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, which she founded.

The daughter of the late Wal-Mart Stores Inc. founder Sam Walton, Alice Walton, now 64, was stopped by Davis on Interstate 20 near Weatherford, Texas, according to records. She was driving her silver 2010 Lexus RX 450 at 71 mph in an unattended 55 mph construction zone, according to the records.

Walton was returning home to Millsap, Texas, after a dinner with friends on her 62nd birthday when the trooper stopped her vehicle.

Walton refused a breath-alcohol test, according to Davis’ report.

In his report, Davis wrote that there was a strong odor of alcohol in Walton’s vehicle and that she showed numerous signs of intoxication during field sobriety tests. During the “Walk and Turn Test,” Walton could not balance, stopped while walking and used her arms to balance, Davis wrote in the report.

“Walton stated, ‘I can’t do that at any time, I’m not balanced,’” Davis wrote in the report. “I finished explaining the test to Walton. She stated, ‘I can’t do that in any situation.’”

Walton was handcuffed and taken to the Parker County jail in Weatherford. She was detained there from 11:12 p.m. to 8:39 a.m., when she was released on $1,000 bond, according to records.

During the investigation of the case, prosecutors obtained two letters that physicians wrote on Oct. 31, 2011, to Walton’s attorney, Dee J. Kelly of Fort Worth, saying Walton can’t walk or maintain balance normally, according to reports.

The physicians reportedly cited a severe motor-vehicle accident in Mexico in November 1983, which led to repeated problems with Walton’s left leg, leaving it substantially shorter than her right.

In May 1998, Walton was found guilty of drunken driving by a Springdale Municipal Court judge after a Jan. 27 accident in which she crashed her 1998 Toyota 4Runner into a steel utility cage on a rural road near her home in Lowell, according to previous Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.

And, in 1989, Walton’s vehicle struck and killed a 50-year-old woman who had stepped out into traffic on Arkansas 265. Police said Walton was not at fault, and they issued no citations, according to the reports.

Arkansas, Pages 14 on 10/27/2013

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