Pa. bar owner says trooper fudged traffic stop

PITTSBURGH (AP) — A Pennsylvania bar owner says in a federal lawsuit that a state trooper pulled her over in retaliation for her complaints about state police arresting too many people for drunken driving.

Dianne Thompson owns a bar in Bradford and says Trooper Matthew Petrof ticketed her last October for littering and sitting too long at a yellow light, but not before first making her submit to a blood-alcohol test.

Thompson’s suit says Petrof claimed she failed field-sobriety tests, smelled of alcohol and was glassy eyed to justify the stop. But she says the blood test showed no alcohol in her system and a judge later dismissed the tickets against her.

Thompson says she’s being targeted for speaking out about Kane-based troopers. The state police have not returned a request for comment on the lawsuit.