Durango School District 9-R issued a statement Wednesday saying no students were in imminent danger of a suspected drunken driver who drove onto Miller Middle School’s campus Tuesday while children were playing outside.

“The school district discovered that the car was traveling at less than 5 mph and no children were in danger,” the statement reads. “Two teachers coaxed the driver to stop and vacate the vehicle. Then police authorities took over the situation as they were already on campus and were able to address the situation immediately.”

The statement sought to downplay remarks made a day earlier by John Wade, a teacher’s aide, who said he pushed several kids out of harm’s way.

The incident occurred shortly before 12:20 p.m. Tuesday when Sophia Casuse, 42, drove a black 1986 Volvo onto campus at 2608 Junction St.

Casuse, who is about 28 weeks pregnant, was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving. She was driving on a revoked New Mexico driver’s license, police said.

She was being held Wednesday night in the La Plata County jail on $750 bail.

The school district did not notify parents of the incident until Tuesday night, after being contacted for a response to a story the Herald was working on.

On Wednesday, district officials asked witnesses, including children, to submit written statements describing what they saw.

As of 7 p.m., the district released only the statement from Dean Garland, a teacher of math and science.

Garland said he was on recess duty at the north end of the football field when he noticed a car driving on a sidewalk near a basketball court.

“The car was moving very slowly – I would guess less than 5 mph,” he wrote. “I started walking up the sidewalk toward the car, motioning for the driver to stop.”

The driver brought the car to a stop, and Garland walked up to the driver’s side window.

“As I was talking with the driver and trying to find out why/how she ended up on our field, John (Wade) and Mike Breunig were having the kids on the court move to the other side of the court,” Garland wrote.

Garland said he had the driver turn her car engine off. She then stepped out of the car and started to walk away. Near the end of the sidewalk, she knelt down or fell over, Garland said.

Police eventually arrested her.

About 30 children were on the basketball court at the time of the incident, Garland said.

“I never felt like the kids were in danger,” he wrote. “There was no panic exhibited from the kids, they quickly moved away from the situation.”

In an interview Tuesday, Wade said he pushed six kids into the gated basketball court.

He gave a similar statement Wednesday to the school district, said district spokeswoman Julie Popp, but the district did not release his statement.

“If she would have just kept going, she might have killed some kids,” Wade told the Herald on Tuesday. “It would have been bad.”

Durango police officers arrested Casuse at the scene. A police spokesman said official reports were not ready for release Wednesday.

shane@durangoherald.com