Drive drunk. Talk dirty.
The unlikely connection was an inadvertent option made available to some DUI offenders this week due to a phone-number foul-up by the state Motor Vehicle Division.
Tucson defense attorney Jim Nesci was sitting at his desk Wednesday morning when his secretary started laughing uncontrollably. He asked her why.
She had called a toll-free number provided by the state to arrange for the installation of an ignition interlock system on a client's car, she replied. And the message at that number invited her to call another 1-800 number for all of the X-rated talk she could handle for just 69 cents a minute.
When Nesci called the number provided by the Arizona Motor Vehicle Division, he got the same breathless recording. He told his secretary to just move on to one of the five other companies authorized to install the device, which is designed to prevent people from driving under the influence.
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A simple typo was the problem, MVD spokeswoman Cydney DeModica said. Someone had typed "1-800" for Alcohol Detection Systems Inc. into a database when it should have been "1-888."
The problem has been around since October, but officials thought they had corrected the number in all of their databases, DeModica said.
Apparently not.
As a result, an unknown number of letters went out to people convicted of driving under the influence directing them to call the sex-talk line, she said. DeModica said the problem has now been fixed for real, and anyone checking the MVD's Web site will find the correct number.
"We certainly regret the error that was in place," she said.
