Salinas man – Carlos Alvarez, 33, of Salinas, was sentenced to three years in state prison for his seventh DUI conviction. Police found him asleep in the drive-through line at an In-N-Out restaurant in June 2025, smelling strongly of alcohol and bodily fluids.
A Salinas man convicted of driving drunk for the seventh time will spend years in state prison after officers found him asleep behind the wheel in an In-N-Out drive-through line.
Carlos Alvarez, 33, of Salinas, was sentenced to three years in state prison for his seventh DUI conviction, according to the Monterey County district attorney’s office. Prosecutors said Alvarez’s record is steep: four felony DUI convictions have come in the last 10 years.
The case began with an incident in June 2025. Alvarez was arrested on a felony DUI charge following a security guard’s alert to California Highway Patrol officers about a “possible drunk driver that was asleep at the wheel in the drive through line. ” prosecutors said. When CHP officers made contact with Alvarez. they immediately smelled the strong odor of “urine. vomit. and an alcoholic beverage coming from within the car. ” according to prosecutors.
Alvarez’s felony DUI arrest was tied to his prior convictions, the district attorney’s office said. The office did not disclose what sentences, if any, were imposed on Alvarez for those earlier convictions.
Investigators with the CHP looked into the case, and it was prosecuted by the Monterey County district attorney’s specialized DUI Vertical Prosecution Unit.
The sequence of events left little room for debate about impairment. A security guard alerted officers to a driver asleep at the wheel. CHP found Alvarez in the drive-through and detected strong odors consistent with intoxication and illness. and prosecutors moved forward on a felony charge rooted in repeated DUI convictions.
Salinas DUI In-N-Out California Highway Patrol Monterey County district attorney Carlos Alvarez drunk driving DUI conviction