A 28-year-old Palm Coast woman is facing a DUI charge after school staff at Wadsworth Elementary School flagged her as impaired while she tried to pick up a child on Oct. 15, deputies say. Rebecca Beard could not legibly write the student's name on the sign-out sheet, had slurred speech and glassy eyes, and struggled just to get through the front door, according to the account from law enforcement.
According to the Flagler County Sheriff's Office, staff first noticed “a woman in the front lobby was attempting to pick up a child and appeared impaired” and alerted a school resource deputy. Surveillance footage reviewed by investigators reportedly showed Beard driving erratically as she entered the school's parking lot before she ever made it inside.
Deputies who responded said they smelled alcohol on her breath and observed that she was unsteady, slurring her words and appeared tired. When they asked why, Beard told them she had taken prescription medication the night before and was drowsy, the sheriff's office says.
Field Sobriety Tests and Breath Results
Beard reportedly struggled to keep her balance and repeatedly failed to follow deputies' instructions during field sobriety exercises, leading to her arrest on a DUI charge. She provided two breath samples afterward, and the sheriff's office says the first came back at a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.298 and the second at 0.294 — more than three times Florida's legal limit of 0.08, per the WKRC report on the case.
Under Florida law, a blood- or breath-alcohol level of 0.08 or higher is enough to establish driving under the influence, and the threshold climbs to enhanced penalties at 0.15 or above, according to the Florida Legislature. The same statute framework treats a reading of 0.08 or higher as prima facie evidence of impairment for anyone behind the wheel.
Deputies also say they found a large, empty bottle of vodka tucked under the back passenger seat of Beard's vehicle. She was released on a $1,000 bond following her arrest, the sheriff's office reported.
Sheriff Credits Staff for Intervening
Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said school staff alerted deputies in time for them to intervene before Beard could drive away with the student. Staly thanked the staff for acting under the district's “see something, say something” policy, crediting the quick report with preventing the child from leaving the campus with her.
Flagler Schools Superintendent LaShakia Moore echoed that praise, saying employees helped keep students and campuses safe by reporting the situation when they noticed something was wrong. The case has drawn comparisons to a similar incident this year in Orem, Utah, where a daycare worker's call to police led to the arrest of 39-year-old Whitney Jensen after she allegedly tried to pick up her child with a blood alcohol content of 0.419, according to KUTV.
