CHP Cites Five Teen Girls After Hookah Bar Trip

A group of five southern Marin girls allegedly got themselves into a heap of trouble early Saturday morning, though California Highway Patrol officials said it could have been a lot worse.

According to CHP Sergeant Marcus Bartholomew, officers pulled over a Toyota Scion that was weaving on Hwy. 101 northbound just south of the Rodeo Avenue exit near Sausalito at around 2:20 a.m. Five girls were in the Scion, police said, and the driver was a 15-year-old girl with only a learners permit but drver’s license.

Police said the girl had been serving as the designated driver for the other girls, several of whom had been drinking alcohol. The other girls in the car were ages 14, 16, 17 and 17.

The girls had told their parents that they were all spending the night at each other’s houses, but instead drove to San Francisco to go to a hookah bar, Bartholomew said.

Officers found marijuana, smoking paraphernalia, and a mixed alcoholic beverage in an iced tea bottle inside the car.

The females were all high school students who live in Corte Madera, Greenbrae and Tiburon. Officers issued citations and the teen’s parents were called to respond and pick up their children.

Bartholomew said the 15-year-old girl had good intentions in being a sober designated driver, but did so illegally because she didn’t have a driver’s license.

“The 15-year-old driver who held only a permit was trying to do the right thing and be a ‘designated driver’ because the owner of the car had been drinking alcohol,” he said. “Unfortunately, we can’t overlook the fact that we had an unlicensed and inexperienced driver with a car full of underage teens illegally possessing alcohol and marijuana at two o’clock in the morning. I call that a recipe for an injury or fatality collision involving multiple young lives.”