E. Hampton woman gets probation in DWI case

A former Hamptons real estate broker was given probation on a drunken driving conviction in a Riverhead courtroom after she showed the judge she has stayed sober for a year.

East Hampton resident Charlotte DePersia, 58, was arrested Nov. 27, 2010, after her sport utility vehicle went over the yellow line and hit a car on Montauk Highway in Bridgehampton. The other car was carrying two couples. Two women, one pregnant, were injured.

At the sentencing Tuesday before Judge William Conlon, DePersia was fined $1,575, given five years' probation, and ordered to wear an ankle bracelet monitor and have an ignition interlock put on her car. She was also ordered to perform 840 hours of community service. Even a minor violation can send her to jail, said her attorney, Tad Scharfenberg of East Hampton.

"It was her fault they were hurt, and she accepts full responsibility for her actions," Scharfenberg said and also noted that his client went to intensive three-hour-a-day, five-day-a-week rehabilitation.

The Suffolk County district attorney's office asked for the maximum of 11/3 to 4 years in prison because DePersia was on probation after a 2009 driving while intoxicated charge when the accident occurred.

"There comes a time when a person such as this should be doing jail time instead of getting break after break after break," District Attorney Thomas Spota said.

Spota noted the high number of recent driving under the influence crashes, many involving children, including the death of a 5-year-old boy Saturday in Shirley.

"It's carnage on the roads," Spota said. "And to then have judges giving out probation for someone already on probation, it's disheartening."

DePersia faces another court case on Dec. 21, this time for the probation violation on the 2009 DWI arrest. The district attorney's office will ask for a year in jail, Spota said.