DUI rampage through East L.A. town results in four people injured, several cars wrecked

Perhaps the most egregious drunk driving incident of the Cinco de Mayo weekend came early on out of East L.A., when a man behind the wheel of his parked car awoke out of a drunken stupor, started the car and drove off -- and proceeded to injure four people, damage six vehicles and generally wreak havoc on the neighborhood.

According to Sgt. David Holwager of the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department, several calls came in at about 2:15 p.m. Thursday after witnesses spotted a man asleep behind the wheel of his white Chevy Tahoe -- apparently passed-out drunk -- near Clara Park in Cudahy. Even as dispatchers were typing in the information, however, the man woke up and drove away -- immediately slamming into two parked cars and sideswiping a third vehicle on the 4800 block of Clara Street.

But he wasn’t done there. The driver, identified only as a “male Hispanic,” continued on even when sheriff’s deputies caught up to him on Atlantic Avenue -- “driving erratically, with noticeable collision damage” -- and tried to pull him over. He refused, authorities say, instead blowing through two red lights.

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