The release of a report has revealed details of the Thanksgiving drunk driving arrest of a well-known doctor in The Villages.
Dr. Felix Esarey, 49, who resides in the Villages of Parkwood, had been driving a black Nissan pickup shortly after midnight on U.S. Hwy. 27/441 at Martin Luther King Boulevard in Fruitland Park when he failed to maintain a single lane, according to an arrest report from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office.
During a traffic stop, a deputy found that Esarey’s eyes were “red, bloodshot and glassy” and his speech was “slurred.”
The deputy asked Esarey, owner of Tri-County Podiatry in The Villages, if he had been drinking.
“He would not answer but instead asked me to call him a ride to come pick him up,” the deputy wrote in his report.
Esarey was asked to get out of the vehicle, and would not do so despite multiple requests from the deputy. Esarey continued to tell the deputy to call him a ride.
The deputy asked the doctor to participate in field sobriety exercises. Esarey refused to do so, even after the deputy explained the potential consequences of refusal.
He was then placed under arrest for DUI.
During the trip to the jail, Esarey “kept advising he wanted me to call certain other high ranking deputies to see if they could get him out of jail,” the deputy’s report said.
Esarey refused to provide a breath sample. He was released after posting $1,000 bond.
