Report: Officer says his last drink was 5 hours before DUI arrest

A Seattle police patrol sergeant arrested on investigation of drinking and driving earlier this month told the arresting trooper that he hadn't consumed alcohol for five hours before being pulled over, according to a State Patrol incident report.

Sgt. Scott Moss, 41, said he had spent the evening in Bremerton and was asleep just before a friend dropped him off around 5 a.m. April 3 to pick up his vehicle on the Eastside, the report says. He told the trooper he hadn't had anything to drink since midnight.

Moss was driving north on Interstate 405 near Newcastle when he was pulled over at 5:05 a.m. after a trooper saw his Jeep Cherokee drift onto the freeway's shoulder, the report says. The trooper smelled intoxicants after approaching Moss, a 16-year department veteran.

The report also explains why more than 1 ½ hours elapsed between the time Moss was pulled over and when his blood alcohol content (BAC) was measured.

Trooper Michael Mong explained in his report that the battery for his portable breathalyzer machine was dead, so Moss didn't have the opportunity to provide a breath sample before Mong drove him to the Issaquah City Jail.

At the jail, Moss spoke by phone with a public defender before providing breath samples about 1 ½ hours after he was stopped. His BAC was measured at .069 and .075 percent, according to the report.

Mong's supervisor, Sgt. Kim Triplett, contacted Seattle police, notified the agency of Moss' arrest, and asked that a commander come to Issaquah to pick Moss up, according to the report she wrote.

Moss questioned why he was being arrested because his BAC was below the legal limit of .08. Triplett told him "that by doing the math it was easy to tell he was over the .08 (legal limit) at the time of the stop."

"I explained to him that there was no way we were going to allow him to drive," she wrote.

A Seattle police spokesman confirmed the department's Office of Professional Accountability has launched an internal investigation as a result of Moss' arrest.

Information from Seattle Times archives is included in this report.

Sara Jean Green: 206-515-5654 or sgreen@seattletimes.com