Ex-Mets pitcher, new Henderson cop was ‘swerving’ all over road, report says

A former Major League Baseball pitcher who was about to embark on a new career as a police officer was seen “swerving all over the road” and “hitting medians” before he was arrested on a misdemeanor DUI charge, according to a Henderson Police Department arrest report.

Because of the Friday arrest, Chasen Bradford’s career as a Henderson police officer was effectively ended before it started.

The 34-year-old was “promptly terminated,” police said.

His arrest came just one day after he was welcomed as a probationary officer into the Henderson department upon graduating the police academy, according to a statement from Henderson’s police chief.

An arrest report released Monday by the Henderson Municipal Court gave more details of the allegations against Bradford, a Las Vegas native and Silverado High School graduate who pitched for the New York Mets in 2017 and for the Seattle Mariners in 2018 and 2019, amassing a 7-0 record, according to Baseball Reference.

He also pitched for four seasons for the Las Vegas 51s, the Triple-A affiilate of the Mets at that time.

According to the report, Henderson dispatchers told officers that someone had just called in a possibly intoxicated driver at 10:23 p.m. Friday in the Eastern Avenue and Sundridge Heights Parkway area.

The caller described a “gray Ford pickup truck with an American flag sticker on the left side rear window, which was swerving all over the road and ‘hitting medians,’” the report stated.

The witness said the vehicle was “driving up on a curb” as it was driving on Anthem Parkway approaching Anthem Club Drive.

A Henderson police officer stopped a Ford pickup truck matching the caller’s description on Anthem Parkway and Schaeffer Hills. The driver identified himself as Bradford, police said.

Another officer arrived and was told by the officer who pulled Bradford over that he suspected impairment because there was an “aroma of an unknown alcoholic beverage coming from within the vehicle,” the arrest report alleged.

At that point, Bradford was told that another citizen had called police because Bradford’s vehicle had been seen “swerving all over the road,” the arrest report stated.

Bradford “satisfactorily completed the Walk and Turn test, but unsatisfactorily completed the One Leg Stand,” the arrest report alleged. An officer also said they saw “six out of a possible six clues of impairment” after conducting what’s known as a horizontal gaze nystagamus test, which involves the officer looking at a driver’s eyes.

Bradford also blew into a Preliminary Breath Test, police said, and according to the test, his blood alcohol content was .104 percent. Nevada’s legal blood alcohol content limit for driving is .08 percent.

Bradford told officers he had had consumed two beers, at 9:45 p.m. and 10:15 p.m., and that he didn’t feel the effects of those beers, the report notes.

But when speaking to an officer just before 11 p.m., the arrest report stated, Bradford was asked how many alcoholic beverages he had consumed, “to which he responded five or six beers throughout the course of the day.”

Bradford was then taken to the Henderson Detention Center, where he was given two more breath tests. At the jail, he blew a .094 percent blood alcohol content on the first test and .098 percent on the second, police said.

He was booked into the jail on a misdemeanor DUI charge, police said.

In a letter posted to the department’s Facebook page on Saturday, Chief Hollie Chadwick wrote the following:

“On Thursday, March 21, 2024, The Henderson Police Department welcomed 14 new officers who graduated our Police Academy.

“On the evening of March 22, 2024, one of those officers chose to drink and drive resulting in their arrest by the Henderson Police Department.

“This probationary officer was promptly terminated and is no longer a member of the Henderson Police Department.”

According to another Henderson Police Department statement issued Saturday, Bradford was hired by the City of Henderson on Sept. 25, 2023. According to a police spokesperson, police recruits are hired as just that, recruits, and then they join the department as probationary officers after graduating the academy.

Bradford was released from the jail on Saturday after paying a cash bond of $2,000, court records show, with the conditions he abstain from using alcohol, controlled substances, or marijuana and not be arrested again or be subject to any criminal citations.

Efforts to reach Bradford for comment were unsuccessful.

An arraignment has been set for April 22 at the Henderson Municipal Court, court records show.

Contact Brett Clarkson at bclarkson@reviewjournal.com.