When most people hear “DUI,” they picture drunk or drugged drivers weaving across lanes.
But two investigative teams in Nashville say there’s a much quieter story hiding behind those numbers – hundreds of Tennesseans arrested for DUI while completely sober.
FOX 17’s Kelly Avellino and WSMV4’s Jeremy Finley have spent the past year digging into those cases.
Their work paints a picture of confused drivers, shaky field tests, delayed lab results and a justice system that is sometimes branding sober people as impaired.
A NASA Engineer Pulled Over, A Life Upended
Kelly Avellino’s latest report for FOX 17 centers on Labreesha Batey, a NASA systems engineer driving through Giles County in May 2024.
Batey was pulled over by Tennessee Highway Patrol Trooper Nathan Methvin for speeding. That part wasn’t disputed.
What happened next is what turned her into the face of Tennessee’s “sober DUI” problem.
Body camera video obtained by Avellino shows Methvin asking Batey to pull her car forward beyond a guardrail.
Batey later told FOX 17 she misheard him and thought he’d told her to drive to “Gross Road,” an exit ahead.
So she kept going, looking for the ramp.
Methvin, confused and apparently thinking she might be trying to flee, hit his sirens.
When Batey finally pulled over again, the situation escalated fast.
The video shows the trooper drawing his weapon, ordering her out of the car, then telling her to get on the ground and handcuffing her.
Batey, who lives in Alabama, told Avellino she’d just come back from planning her grandmother’s funeral and had never been arrested before.
“It’s still hard to relive that experience,” she said, calling it “a horrific experience to be dehumanized in that manner.”
When Field Sobriety Tests Fail Sober Drivers
On camera, Batey can be heard telling Trooper Methvin she doesn’t drink or smoke when he asks about alcohol or drugs.
She repeatedly insists she’s sober and even asks for a breathalyzer, something many “sober DUI” defendants have begged officers for in similar cases.
Instead, Methvin un-cuffs her and conducts a series of field sobriety tests on the roadside for about 13 minutes.
In his written report, Avellino notes, Methvin claimed Batey missed heel-to-toe steps, took the wrong number of steps, turned improperly and was unsteady on her feet.
He also wrote that she “missed all finger-to-nose touches” and showed problems on an eye test known as horizontal gaze nystagmus, which can indicate alcohol or neurological issues.
But when FOX 17 reviewed the bodycam video, Avellino reports the footage doesn’t fully match the narrative.
Batey appears to hesitate on just two finger-to-nose touches, and she maintains her balance throughout the tests.
Weeks later, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s bloodwork came back.
No alcohol.
No drugs.
Batey was completely sober.
Her DUI charge was dismissed and expunged – but the damage didn’t disappear.
She told Avellino she’s been diagnosed with PTSD, gone through therapy, racked up legal costs, and watched a mugshot spread that she says threatened her job and career.
“There’s a problem in Tennessee,” Batey said flatly.
From a common-sense standpoint, it’s hard to argue with her. When a completely sober NASA engineer walks away from a traffic stop labeled a drunk driver – even temporarily – something in the system is misfiring.
Data Shows Hundreds Of “Sober DUI” Arrests
Batey’s case isn’t an outlier. It’s a symptom.
According to Avellino’s investigation, FOX 17 dug through hundreds of federal court records and confirmed 22 “sober DUI” lawsuits filed in Tennessee since 2024 alone.
Those suits target a mix of agencies, with seven involving Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers.
Damages sought range from $75,000 to as high as $20 million, and one man arrested in Monroe County received a $75,000 settlement after his sober DUI case was resolved.
Behind those lawsuits is a much larger group of people who never sued at all.
FOX 17’s earlier reporting, cited again in Avellino’s story, found more than 600 Tennesseans arrested for DUI while completely sober since 2017, based on TBI records.
WSMV4’s Jeremy Finley independently confirms that number from another angle.
In a separate investigation, Finley reports that TBI data shows 609 drivers arrested for DUI between 2017 and 2023 who had no alcohol and no drugs in their system.
That came only after WSMV4 fought for months to obtain statistical data from the TBI.
Finley explains that initial requests for bloodwork records were denied as “confidential.”
When his team pushed for aggregate statistics instead, TBI first released a report showing 31,567 DUI arrestees during that period had 0.00% blood alcohol – but the data didn’t say how many still had drugs in their system.
After more pressure, Finley says, the agency finally produced the key figure: 609 people had neither alcohol nor drugs in their blood.
On paper, that’s less than 1% of DUI arrests.
In real life, with roughly 15,000 DUI arrests a year in Tennessee, it represents hundreds of sober drivers hauled off to jail for a crime they didn’t commit.
Calling that “rare” doesn’t make it less devastating if you’re the one in cuffs.
A Trucker’s Morning Commute Turns Into A Nightmare
To show how those numbers play out on the roadside, Finley highlights the case of Xavier Gray in Wilson County.
Bodycam footage reviewed by WSMV4 begins with a telling image: as deputies approach Gray’s car, his hands are already in the air.
“First of all, I’m scared of the police,” Gray admits to Finley.
The affidavit claims he crossed the center line, had red eyes, and responded slowly to questions. Deputies wrote that he showed signs of impairment on every field sobriety test.
Gray tells WSMV4 he agreed to the tests because he was afraid of losing his license and his livelihood.
He runs a trucking business and drives a dump truck for a living.
When deputies tell him he’s being arrested for DUI, the bodycam captures his stunned reaction:
“I don’t even drink or anything. This is crazy.”
Months later, Finley reports, TBI bloodwork confirmed what Gray had been saying from the start.
No alcohol.
No drugs.
Gray was sober on his way to work when he was handcuffed on the roadside and accused of being drunk.
He calls it “a miscarriage of justice” and says it feels like it’s happening “all over Tennessee.”
Finley’s reporting also points to a backlog at the TBI’s toxicology lab.
That means innocent drivers like Gray sit under a cloud of suspicion for months – risking jobs, licenses and insurance rates – while they wait for the test that finally clears their name.
From a fairness standpoint, that delay might be one of the most brutal parts of the whole system. It effectively punishes people before the science ever speaks.
Lawmakers, Lawyers And MADD Raise Red Flags
Neither investigation ignores the other side of the equation.
Both Avellino and Finley note that law enforcement and prosecutors argue they cannot simply wave questionable drivers on their way when they see potential signs of impairment.
Officers point out that a small percentage of sober DUI arrests sits next to a huge number of legitimate cases where alcohol or drugs actually are present.
But both reporters also highlight how thin the line can be between “cautious enforcement” and “overreach.”
Avellino revisits FOX 17’s earlier work showing that most Middle Tennessee agencies no longer rely on breathalyzers in patrol cars, instead favoring blood draws because they show both alcohol and drugs and are more useful in court.
Some attorneys and “sober DUI” victims told FOX 17 they believe that’s a mistake, because a breath test in the field can give officers real-time proof that alcohol is not the issue.
Rutherford County attorney Scott Kimberly, who handles DUI cases, told Avellino that more training is needed to help officers recognize other causes for “failing” a field test – age, fatigue, medical conditions or just nervousness.
On the advocacy side, Finley interviews Alex Otte, executive director of Mothers Against Drunk Driving in Tennessee.
Otte is clear: nobody wants to see impaired drivers on the road.
But she also acknowledges how troubling it is that sober people keep showing up in DUI stats at all, saying those cases are “tragic for anyone involved.”
In the legislature, both investigations point to the role of Rep. Lowell Russell, who took an interest after one of his constituents was wrongly arrested for DUI while sober.
Avellino notes that Batey worked directly with lawmakers in 2025 to push through a new state law – Senate Bill 1166 – requiring an annual public report listing every law enforcement agency that records “sober DUI” arrests.
Sen. Raumesh Akbari and Rep. Johnny Shaw sponsored the bill, with Russell and several others co-sponsoring.
Akbari told FOX 17 that having that report will “create a lot of transparency.”
If the numbers stay high, the public will see it.
If they drop, that will show too.
Either way, Batey’s painful traffic stop has already helped force the issue into the open.
What “Sober DUI” Says About Power And Accountability
Taken together, Kelly Avellino and Jeremy Finley are telling a story that goes beyond individual mistakes.
They’re describing a system where:
– Split-second roadside judgments can override calm explanations from sober drivers.
– Subjective field tests can outweigh objective lab results, at least in the moment.
– Lab backlogs turn months of someone’s life into a waiting room for vindication.
– Agencies still resist releasing data until the media and lawmakers apply pressure.
Of course, officers have a hard job, and nobody seriously argues that DUI enforcement should be relaxed.
But when more than 600 people in one state are arrested for DUI with zero alcohol and zero drugs in their system, it’s not just a series of flukes.
It looks like a design problem.
Both investigations point toward the same solutions: better training, better tools, faster lab work and more transparency about who’s getting arrested and what the tests actually show.
At the end of the day, “sober DUI” is a phrase that shouldn’t really exist.
Yet Tennesseans like Labreesha Batey and Xavier Gray are living with the fallout from those three words – in their careers, their finances and their mental health.
If anything good comes from their stories, it may be that the public finally starts asking a simple question every time a DUI case pops up on a police blotter:
Was this driver truly impaired?
Or is this one of the 600-plus who were never under the influence at all?
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The article Investigation Finds More Than 600 Tennesseans Hit With “Sober DUI” Charges first appeared on Survival World.
Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, John developed a love for the great outdoors early on. With years of experience as a wilderness guide, he’s navigated rugged terrains and unpredictable weather patterns. John is also an avid hunter and fisherman who believes in sustainable living. His focus on practical survival skills, from building shelters to purifying water, reflects his passion for preparedness. When he’s not out in the wild, you can find him sharing his knowledge through writing, hoping to inspire others to embrace self-reliance.
