US soccer star Hope Solo pleaded guilty to driving while impaired Monday nearly four months after she was found passed out behind the wheel of a car with her two-year-old twins in the backseat at a North Carolina Walmart.
The former women’s national team goalkeeper was handed down an active sentence of 30 days and a suspended sentence of 24 months as well as $2,500 in fines plus a $600 fee to cover the cost of lab tests.
Solo, 40, was given 30 days credit for time she spent at an in-patient rehabilitation center and was ordered to undergo a substance abuse assessment and complete all recommended treatment.
She was also charged with misdemeanor child abuse and resisting a public officer in connection to the March incident, but both charges were voluntarily dropped according to her attorney Chris Clifton.
Solo, of Roaring Gap, was arrested on March 31 after a passer-by spotted her passed out for more than an hour in the driver’s seat of a car whose engine was left running in the parking lot of a Walmart in Winston-Salem. Solo’s two children were in the backseat.
The person called 911 and a responding officer could smell alcohol on Solo, according to an arrest warrant.
The goalie refused to take a Breathalyzer, but a warrant-issued blood test revealed her blood-alcohol level was at 0.24% — three times the legal limit.
Solo called the incident the biggest mess-up of her life in a statement released after she pleaded guilty.
“Easily the worst mistake of my life. I underestimated what a destructive part of my life alcohol had become,” she said. “The upside of making a mistake this big is that hard lessons are learned quickly. Learning these lessons has been difficult, and at times, very painful.”
Following her arrest, Solo took to social media to defend her parenting.
“Our family is strong and surrounded with love. Our kids are strong, intelligent, happy and vibrant, and we are present every day giving them the best life possible,” Solo wrote in an Instagram story.
She shares twins, Vittorio Genghis and Lozen Orianna Judith Stevens, who were born in March 2020 with her husband Jerramy Stevens, a former tight end for the Seattle Seahawks and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
In April, the two-time Olympic gold medalist announced she was entering rehab for alcoholism. She asked the National Soccer Hall of Fame to postpone its ceremony to induct her into the hall until 2023 so that she can attend an in-patient alcohol treatment program.