SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- A family says their son was unfairly harrassed by Springfield police.
On Wednesday night, Jonathan Coker was getting ready for his second night on the job as a sandwich delivery driver, so he was understandably nervous.
"It's hard to drive at night as is," the teens said.
And then there's what happened his first night.
"Everything was going smoothly and, about 2 a.m., I was doing my last delivery, and I guess I didn't notice anyone was behind me, and I guess I didn't use my blinker. The cop car turned on his lights, pulled me ovet," Coker said, recalling the early morning hours of Valentine's Day.
Coker says the officer asked if he'd been drinking and he said no.
"He asked me if I was on drugs. I said I was not, and he said my eyes were too dilated to not be on anything," Coker said.
As a result, Coker never made that sandwich delivery.
Here's how it works: if a police officer pulls somebody over for suspected DWI, the officer gives the driver a field sobriety test at the scene, but, if drugs are a possiblity, the person is arrested and taken to the Greene County Jail for a different series of tests.
"They include eye checks, blood pressure, pulse," looking for heat bumps on the tongue. That's the job of a DRE or drug recognition expert.
Officer Shawn Clawson is in charge of the eight DREs with the Springfield Police Department. While he can't talk about Coker, he can talk about why people like Coker end up in jail.
"If [the officer] believes [the driver] is unsafe to drive, if he's showing those outward signs often very simliar to alcohol, they'll make an arrest," Clawson said.
Coker and his mom believe there was no reason for the teen to be arrested, that, in fact, he was being harrassed.
"He was scared. He's 18 years old and he sat here and cried huge tears and that broke my heart," said Tami Turbyeville. "There was no reason for that."
Or this -- new job jitters that have nothing to do with the actual job.
"Police officers aren't supposed to act that way, that's something you see in movies. That's exactly what he said to me, 'Mom, this is what you see in movies,'" Turbyeville said.
Coker's parents picked him up at the Greene County jail at 6:30 that morning without any charges or citations. After blowing a zero into a breathalyzer, he allowed police to draw his blood. Those results could take between 8 and 20 weeks to come back from the state crime lab, and Coker says he's confident they will be negative.
In the meantime, his mom has filed an official complaint with the Springfield Police Department and is looking at hiring an attorney.
