Ex-Robbinsdale councilor convicted of DWI to serve 3 years of probation

A former Robbinsdale city councilmember who pleaded guilty in June to drunken driving attended a sentencing hearing Friday morning.

Tyler Kline, 38, will serve three years of probation with electronic home monitoring and will be required to pay a $15,000 fine, $14,000 of which is stayed for three years.

Kline was arrested in January after a wrong-way crash and police chase on Highway 100. When he was finally stopped by police, tests showed his blood-alcohol concentration was 0.20, according to a criminal complaint.

Kline resigned from the Robbinsdale City Council, saying it “was not an easy decision to make, but the right one for me and my family.”

He then pleaded guilty in June to two counts of DWI and one count of fleeing police.

During the sentencing hearing Friday, Kline apologized to those on the road that he put at risk and law enforcement officers who were at the scene of the incident. Kline said that hearing the events retold to him, having no memory of them, was “really horrific.”

Judge Tamara Garcia, who oversaw the case, said the risk to public safety during Kline’s fleeing from officers “was significant.” She remarked that the only way to stop Kline’s vehicle was for an officer to drive a squad vehicle into it. She also said his intoxication was an aggravating factor, all of which led to her decision to deny Kline’s request for an immediate downward departure from a felony fleeing an officer charge to a gross misdemeanor charge.

“This was a bad flee,” Garcia said.

However, Garcia said if Kline successfully completes his probation, his fleeing an officer in a motor vehicle charge will drop from a felony to a misdemeanor.