Justin Timberlake Arrested for DWI in New York

Jem Aswad
·4 min read
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UPDATED: Justin Timberlake was arrested early Tuesday in Sag Harbor on New York’s Long Island, police confirm to Variety. The singer, 43, was arraigned on Tuesday morning and released without bail after being charged with one count of driving while intoxicated.

According to the police report, a Sag Harbor officer spotted Timberlake’s gray 2025 BMW weaving out of a lane and going through a stop sign. The officer pulled over the car and noted that Timberlake had “bloodshot and glassy” eyes and a “strong odor” of alcohol on his breath, and was unsteady on his feet. He then asked the singer to undertake a series of field sobriety tests, including walking in a straight line and standing on one leg, on which he “performed poorly,” according to the report.

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“I had one martini and followed my friends home,” Timberlake told the officer, per the report. He refused three requests to take a Breathalyzer test.

“The charge was a single count because he refused the breath test,” his lawyer, Ed Burke, told Us Weekly. “Mr. Timberlake was also charged with two other court citations, running a stop sign and not traveling in the correct traffic lane.” Burke and multiple reps for Timberlake did not immediately respond to Variety‘s requests for further comment.

A court date is scheduled for July 26, although Timberlake, who is not required to attend the hearing, has a concert in Poland scheduled for that day.

“This is going to ruin the tour,” Timberlake said to the officer, sources told the New York Post. However, although a conviction could result in a year-long jail sentence, the offense is a misdemeanor and it seems likely that he will be fined and have a 90-day suspension of his drivers’ license in New York State. Timberlake has no prior criminal record.

A statement from the Sag Harbor Police Department reads: “On June 18, 2024, at 12:37 AM, Justin R. Timberlake, age 43, of Tennessee, was observed operating a 2025 BMW southbound on Madison Street, failing to stop at a duly posted stop sign and failing to maintain his lane of travel. A traffic stop was initiated by a Police Officer from the Sag Harbor Village Police Department and upon investigation it was determined that Mr. Timberlake was operating his vehicle in an intoxicated condition.
 
“Mr. Timberlake was placed under arrest, processed, and held overnight for morning arraignment,” the statement continues. “Mr. Timberlake was arraigned at the Sag Harbor Village Justice Court on June 18, 2024, at 9:30 AM where he was released on his own recognizance.”

Timberlake is currently on his “Forget Tomorrow” world tour in support of his latest album, “Everything I Thought It Was,” which was released in March. He is next scheduled to perform concerts at Chicago’s United Center on Friday and Saturday, with two more at New York’s Madison Square Garden next week. The North American leg of the tour continues until July 9 in Kentucky; it then is scheduled to head to Europe from the end of July through September before returning to North America in October, with the last date slated for Dec. 20 in Kansas City.

The album, Timberlake’s first since his poorly received 2018 set “Man of the Woods,” met with a middling commercial and critical response, but the tour has gotten rapturous reviews. While Timberlake’s star has slipped a bit since its late 2000s/early 2010s peak — due in part to his allegedly unkind treatment of Britney Spears when they were dating, and his allowing Janet Jackson to effectively take the blame for the infamous “wardrobe malfunction” during their performance together at the 2004 Super Bowl Halftime show — he remains one of the world’s biggest pop stars.

“At his essence, Timberlake is a consummate showman, educated in the school of boyband philosophy where precision is key,” Variety‘s Steven J. Horowitz wrote of a show at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles. “At 43 years old, Timberlake is just as sharp and exact as he’s been throughout his decades-long career, hitting every cue and note with intent and purpose. He’s fresh off the release of his sixth solo album ‘Everything I Thought It Was,’ a sprawling project that often retreated to past tropes and musical habits, as well as the flurry of reputation-shaking headlines that dogged him the past few years.

“But none of that existed in the world he created for his electrifying performance in L.A., where throngs of millennials gathered to relive hits of the past and engage with newer, less familiar material.”

Variety will have more on the situation as it develops.

Additional reporting by Ethan Shanfeld.

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