For the time being, Justin Timberlake is not allowed to drive in New York, after a judge suspended the star’s license as the DWI case against him moves forward. NBC New York’s Pei-Sze Cheng reports.
Justin Timberlake is no longer allowed to drive in the state of New York, a judge ordered at a Long Island court hearing on Friday.
The pop singer had his license suspended because he refused to take a breathalyzer at a traffic stop while in the Hamptons back in June.
Timberlake, who appeared at the hearing virtually via a video conference, will likely have the suspension for six months. He pleaded not guilty.
The judge also threatened Timberlake's attorney, Ed Burke, with a gag order for comments the lawyer made outside court last week.
"It comes off as an attempt to poison the case before it even begins," Judge Carl Irace said.
Last week, Burke said after the hearing that police made “very significant errors” and expects the charge to be dismissed. He also maintained that Timberlake didn’t drive drunk.
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“He was not intoxicated,” Burke told reporters outside court. “I’ll say it again. Justin Timberlake was not intoxicated.”
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Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney's office, which is prosecuting the case, described the paperwork issue as a “ministerial error” and that an amended charging document was filed July 2.
“The facts and circumstance of the case have not been changed or amended,” spokesperson Emily O'Neil said in an email.
Timberlake was charged with the misdemeanor on June 18 after police said he ran a stop sign and veered out of his lane in Sag Harbor, a onetime whaling village mentioned in Herman Melville’s classic novel “Moby-Dick” that's nestled amid the Hamptons, around 100 miles east of New York City.
The boy band singer-turned-solo star and actor was driving a 2025 BMW around 12:30 a.m. when an officer stopped him and determined he was intoxicated, according to a court document.
“His eyes were bloodshot and glassy, a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage was emanating from his breath, he was unable to divide attention, he had slowed speech, he was unsteady afoot and he performed poorly on all standardized field sobriety tests,” the court papers said.
Timberlake, 43, told the officer at the time that he had one martini and was following some friends home, according to the documents. After being arrested and taken to a police station in nearby East Hampton, he refused a breath test.
The 10-time Grammy winner began performing as a young Disney Mouseketeer, rose to fame as part of the boy band NSYNC and embarked on a solo recording career in the early 2000s.
