A Miami-Dade Police officer has been arrested after allegedly driving drunk and crashing into a parked car, striking a shopping cart with two children inside and attempting to flee.
According to Miami-Dade Police, last Saturday, at around 8:22 p.m., 41-year-old Miami-Dade Police officer Ryan Robinson was off-duty when he was driving his 1997 GMC truck inside a shopping plaza in Cutler Bay. He struck the grocery store shopping cart with two children sitting inside after he had hit a parked car. "He hit the cart, and he still kept going," said the father of the children, Manny Garcia. "He was trying to get away from the accident."
Robinson hit the shopping cart the father was pushing with his two small girls, ages 3 and 6, inside of it. The father said the shopping cart fell to its side and the two small girls fell out and suffered minor injuries. "My whole world stopped right there," said Garcia. "I see my two kids on the floor."
Patricia Menzies prevented the officer from leaving scene. "I saw the girls on the floor, and I heard the screaming," she said.
She said she was determined to not let him leave the parking lot and blocked his car in, just as he tried to accelerate from the scene.
The mother of the two girls said the whole ordeal was very frightening. "It was her leg, and my other daughter who is in school right now, it was her head and on her cheek and nose, but they are both fine."
Garcia said he could smell a strong odor of alcohol coming from Robinson. He could also see his red, bloodshot, watery eyes. "He was so drunk that he just fell on the floor, so I was like, yo, sit down. He was like, 'Oh, I'm sorry.' I just told him, yo, sit down."
When police arrived on the scene they arrested Robinson for driving under the influence. In the arrest affidavit, police wrote they noticed an "odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from his breath and bloodshot watery eyes."
Garcia recorded cell phone video of the driver, as he took a sobriety test. "Look, he can't even lift his leg," a voice could be heard saying on the video.
Garcia said his daughters now have a fear of police. "I couldn't believe it, the people that are supposed to protect us are the ones that are hurting us."
In 2007, Robinson was part of a police-involved shooting where two unarmed men were killed in Miami after they were pulled over for speeding. He was exonerated by the Miami-Dade State Attorney's office in that case.
In 2013, he was temporarily relieved of duty after a bottle of vodka was found in his patrol car. In this case, he has been relieved of duty with pay and faces DUI charges.
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