6th OWI: Tosa Woman Arrested, Again

A Wauwatosa woman with her fifth drunken driving charge still pending in court from a September arrest has been arrested and charged yet again, according to court records.

Denise Geri Stoiber, 52, was charged with three felony counts Friday in Milwaukee County Circuit Court: driving while intoxicated for her fifth or sixth time; driving with a proscribed blood-alcohol concentration; and bail jumping.

According to police and court reports:

At 9:34 p.m. Tuesday, Stoiber was stopped for erratic driving in the 1700 block of North Mayfair Road. Two patrol officers in a single squad car saw her make a very wide, slow turn from Blue Mound Road onto Mayfair and, as they followed, saw her weave from one lane to another repeatedly and watched as she twice stopped completely in traffic.

When they pulled Stoiber over, she gave a false name and denied she’d been drinking at all, but the officers smelled a strong odor of alcohol and noted her glassy, bloodshot eyes. One officer noted in her report that she knew the woman from “numerous prior contacts” with the police, in which she had been directly involved twice.

The suspect twice refused to perform field sobriety tests, but when told her refusal would count as a failure and lead to her arrest, she agree to try. She could barely stand and failed all tests.

Her record showed OWI convictions in 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2009. She was under a five-year license revocation order for being a habitual offender and was under an absolute sobriety order.

She refused to give a voluntary blood sample and was forced to submit to a draw at Wisconsin Heart Hospital.

At the station for booking, however, she agreed to give a breath sample and registered a .21 blood alcohol concentration.

The Wauwatosa police reported the arrest and forwarded it to the district attorney as a fifth offense rather than a sixth because they are not allowed to register it as such until a pending case is concluded.

However, Wauwatosa Patch reported Sept. 22, and court records confirm, that she was taken into custody that month and charged with a fifth offense.

In that incident, an employee of Pick 'n Save, 6950 W. State St., called police because she knew Stoiber was intoxicated and about to drive. But before officers could stop her, she got in a car and left the lot.

She was followed and briefly pulled over for police and tried to conceal her identity, but then fled, drove to her apartment, and tried to run inside. She was caught, though, and as in this week's case, refused to give a blood sample.