Newsmaker

Paris Hilton booked on DUI charges

(AP)
Updated: 2006-09-07 19:27

LOS ANGELES - Paris Hilton was arrested early Thursday for investigation of driving under the influence, police said.

Hilton was arrested shortly before 12:30 a.m. after being pulled over in Hollywood, said police Officer I. Isabella, who declined to give his first name.

Paris Hilton talks to reporters as she arrives for an after party for the MTV Video Music Awards in New York, August 31, 2006. [AP]

Police stopped Hilton because she was "driving erratically," he said.

"The officers observed that Hilton exhibited the symptoms of intoxication. A field sobriety test was conducted at scene, and the officers determined she was driving under the influence," Isabella said, reading a police statement.

Hilton was booked on suspicion of misdemeanor DUI and released, he said.

Her spokesman, Elliot Mintz, confirmed the arrest and said police detected the minimum blood-alcohol level to warrant an arrest. The legal limit in California is 0.08 percent.

"She's absolutely fine," Mintz said. "She didn't appear in the least bit to be intoxicated."

At the time of her arrest, Hilton was driving home in her Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren from a charity event where she had one drink, a margarita, he said. She had spent the day shooting a music video for her new album, "Paris."

The driving under the influence symptoms were "probably the result of an empty stomach and working all day and being fatigued," Mintz said.

She was picked up from the Los Angeles Police Department's Hollywood station by her sister, Nicky, Nicky's boyfriend, actor Kevin Connolly, and Mintz.

In June, Hilton had a fender-bender accident when her Range Rover backed into a car in a parking garage after a shopping trip.