{"id":254445,"date":"2026-04-06T18:57:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T18:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/254445\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T18:57:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T18:57:08","slug":"inland-state-sen-sabrina-cervantes-sues-sacramento-over-2025-dui-citation-press-enterprise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/254445\/","title":{"rendered":"Inland state Sen. Sabrina Cervantes sues Sacramento over 2025 DUI citation \u2013 Press Enterprise"},"content":{"rendered":"

Inland state Sen. Sabrina Cervantes<\/a> was \u201ctargeted by Sacramento police officers and subjected to a baseless DUI investigation and arrest\u201d following a 2025 crash near the state Capitol, her lawyer said Monday, April 6, in announcing a lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The suit<\/a> against the city of Sacramento accuses Sacramento police of misconduct and lying after the crash, which led to a citation<\/a> alleging driving under the influence of a drug.<\/p>\n

The Sacramento district attorney\u2019s office declined to file charges<\/a> against Cervantes, D-Riverside, after a blood test showed no drugs or alcohol in her system at the time of the accident.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis case is about the abuse of power,\u201d James Quadra, Cervantes\u2019 lawyer, said in a news release.<\/p>\n

\u201cOfficers ignored the facts, fabricated evidence, and tried to turn a victim into a criminal. Defendants\u2019 conduct violated the law and they must be held accountable.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sacramento Police Department and Sacramento city officials did not immediately respond Monday morning to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

Cervantes, 38, was behind the wheel of a state-issued Toyota Camry when a Ford Explorer broadsided her on the afternoon of May 19, 2025, just blocks from the Capitol building.<\/p>\n

Officers \u201cobserved objective signs of intoxication\u201d in the senator while interviewing her at a hospital where she was treated for minor injuries, a Sacramento police spokesperson said at the time.<\/p>\n

Cervantes\u2019 attorneys released an edited, 15-minute video<\/a> of police body camera footage from their interactions with the senator. The footage shows that police \u201cfalsely claimed Senator Cervantes had an \u2018unsteady gait\u2019 without mentioning she was injured,\u2019\u201d a caption in the video read.<\/p>\n

Lacking probable cause, police sought a warrant for a sample of Cervantes\u2019 blood while \u201cbuilding a case on false statements and omissions,\u201d her lawyer\u2019s release alleges.<\/p>\n

Police also \u201csubmitted false information to the DMV in an effort to justify their actions, which forced Senator Cervantes to retain counsel to clear her name,\u201d the release alleges.<\/p>\n

Sacramento officials \u201ccompounded the harm by leaking false claims to the media that Senator Cervantes had been driving under the influence, damaging her reputation and public standing,\u201d according to the release.<\/p>\n

In a September news conference in Sacramento, Cervantes \u2014 the sister of Riverside City Councilmember and Democratic Assembly candidate Clarissa Cervantes<\/a> \u2014 said it\u2019s been \u201ca very challenging time over the last several months\u201d not only for her, but for her family and staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had folks who\u2019ve asked for my resignation because of this incident (and) these false allegations,\u201d Sabrina Cervantes said at the time<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are attacks that I get every week since this event unfolded and since it was pushed out to the media.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawsuit, filed in federal court, seeks unspecified damages for alleged violations of federal civil rights and California law.<\/p>\n

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Inland state Sen. Sabrina Cervantes was \u201ctargeted by Sacramento police officers and subjected to a baseless DUI investigation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[7,1843,23,8634,612,121,123,122],"class_list":["post-254445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-california","tag-california-legislature","tag-local-news","tag-riverside","tag-riverside-county","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}