A woman will lose her license after a crash earlier this year in a roundabout in The Villages.
Maria Carmen Williams, 30, of Lady Lake, was released last week after 20 days in the Sumter County Detention Center. She had been held there since June 28 after a judge revoked her bond following her arrest in May on a charge of driving under the influence.
In court in Sumter County last week, Williams pleaded no contest to the DUI charge. She will lose her driver’s license for six months and has been placed on probation for one year.
Williams was driving a GMC utility vehicle at about 9:30 p.m. May 12 in the roundabout at Morse Boulevard and Stillwater Trail when she collided with a 2013 Lexus utility vehicle, according to an arrest report from the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office. It appeared Williams had been drinking. She claimed she’d had a single glass of champagne at about 2 p.m. that day. Williams performed poorly in field sobriety exercises. She refused to provide a breath sample. She was arrested on charges of driving under the influence and refusal to submit to a breath test. She was released on $2,000 bond.
While she was free on bond, Williams was arrested again. She was back behind the wheel of her GMC utility vehicle on June 3 when she was pulled over by a Fruitland Park police officer. During a traffic stop, she admitted her license had been suspended as a result of the DUI arrest. Williams claimed she had been told by her attorney that she could drive for “up to 30 days.” The police officer explained that she was not allowed to drive on a suspended license. She was ticketed and her vehicle was towed from the scene. She was not taken into custody at that time.
However, on June 20 a motion was fired by the prosecutor’s office to revoke Williams’ bond. That led to her arrest on June 23 in Lake County. She was later transferred to the Sumter County Detention Center.
