Drunken horseman leads police on a wild ride

It wasn’t O.J. in an SUV, but it was still a pretty good chase — a drunken man on a horse speeding through town with police in pursuit. Police in Bunnell, Fla., about 60 miles south of Jacksonville, say the drunken horseman eluded them for half an hour as he stopped traffic and other vehicles, including a train, according to The Daytona Beach News-Journal.

The saga began as the 29-year-old man left his home on horseback one morning on his way to grandma’s house. No kidding, that’s what he said.

Police got a complaint about a drunken man on horseback relieving himself in someone’s yard. Things got worse after that. Bunnell Police Chief Jeffrey Hoffman, demonstrating a remarkable talent for understatement, told the News-Journal, “We had an intoxicated person on a horse who caused quite a stir.”

Indeed. The horseman refused officers’ order to dismount and instead reared the horse back and took off. Officers had to block traffic as he crossed a busy highway and they halted a southbound train as man and beast crossed railroad tracks.

Hoffman said authorities considered calling in horseback-riding county sheriff’s deputies to help in the pursuit. But the man’s father eventually tackled him off the horse and police caught him.

Hoffman, again in understatement, said it was the first time in 21 years as a law enforcement officer that he had to chase someone on horseback. The drunken horseman faces, among a slew of other charges, separate counts of cruelty to animals and interference with a railroad track.