Just before 6:30 Saturday night, Missoula police officers responded to a parking lot in the 4000 block of Highway 93 South.

According to court documents, a woman called police to report that her grandchildren had called her screaming, told her that their father was driving the car they were in erratically, and that they believed they were going to be killed. Police Public Information Officer Travis Welsh explains.

“When the officers arrived, they found a male in the driver’s seat of a vehicle that was located in this parking lot,” Welsh said. “They identified him as 35-year-old James Kinney. Mr. Kinney appeared to be passed out or otherwise sleeping. Officers woke him up and asked him about his children. He indicated that they were still in the car. When he was informed that they were not in the car, he commented that they must have wandered off and that they were close by. Mr. Kinney did not know that the children’s grandmother had picked them up and gave them safety.”

The officer conducted field sobriety tests and Kinney almost fell over so many times during the One Leg Stand that the officer had to stop the test. Kinney consented to a blood draw, and was transported to St. Patrick’s Hospital. While at the hospital, Kinney was unable to form a coherent sentence to explain how he got to the original parking lot.

Kinney was eventually transported to the Missoula County Jail where he is currently being held for two counts of child criminal endangerment.

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