After alleged DUI, Seattle cop ran inauguration security detail

A Seattle police lieutenant with a troubled past was allowed to supervise a Seattle Police Department security detail at President Obama's inauguration last month after he was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving in November.

Donnie R. Lowe, who has been reprimanded during his 17-year career for inappropriate contact with his son in a holding cell and confronting a man over nude photographs of a relative, was cited for driving under the influence after being stopped on Interstate 5 in South Seattle by a State Patrol trooper.

A blood-alcohol test administered to Lowe about an hour after the stop registered 0.113 percent, above the state's legal limit of 0.08 percent for those over 21, according to a State Patrol report.

Lowe has not entered a plea and is scheduled to be arraigned Feb. 23. Officers convicted of drunken driving can face internal discipline, often a suspension.

Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske, who attended the inauguration and, according to sources, is expected to be named Obama's drug czar, declined to comment on Lowe's participation in the inauguration, as did other top department officials.

Kerlikowske has faced allegations in recent years that he doesn't hold officers accountable for misconduct.

Seattle police spokesman Mark Jamieson declined to comment on Lowe's arrest for drunken driving.

Jamieson said Lowe, who works in the department's Homeland Security Bureau, overseeing planning for special events and disaster management, began working on the inauguration assignment before the incident and carried out his duty to supervise a 42-member Seattle police detail assisting in inaugural security.

Lowe, 42, couldn't be reached for comment Tuesday.

Lowe, who was with a passenger, was stopped by the trooper about 1:45 a.m. on Nov. 23, after the trooper noticed his car drifting in the lanes, the State Patrol report said.

The trooper recognized an odor of alcohol in the car and saw a glass filled with a dark-colored liquid that smelled of alcohol in the middle drink holder, the report said. Lowe had bloodshot and watery eyes, the trooper wrote.

Lowe's record with the Police Department includes a written reprimand following a June 2006 incident in which he entered a jail cell and made inappropriate physical contact with his son, then 13, who had been arrested for obstructing officers and was handcuffed.

The boy alleged he was punched and pushed against a wall, while Lowe told internal investigators he grabbed the boy by his sweat shirt and pulled him up from a bench in way that was "not gentle," police records show.

The City Attorney's Office reviewed the case but declined to bring charges, citing proof problems and a parent's right to discipline a child, police records show.

Lowe also received an oral reprimand stemming from a September 2002 incident in which he entered a private home in an attempt to recover nude photographs of a female relative from a man who reportedly had been romantically involved with her.

In 2007, a citizen-review-board report cited that case as one of several in which Kerlikowske reduced disciplinary findings.

The director of the department's Office of Professional Accountability had recommended findings of misuse of authority and violation of rules, regulations and laws, the board said.

Kerlikowske reached a lesser finding, concluding that the officer engaged in conduct unbecoming an officer, the report said.

Seattle Times news researcher David Turim and Times archives contributed to this story.

Steve Miletich: 206-464-3302 or smiletich@seattletimes.com