A Rome woman was booked into the Polk County Jail late on Friday evening after she was found passed out in her car parked in front of the BP near the intersection of Highway 278 and Highway 101, according to Rockmart Police reports.

Cherieshia Sharnese Hayes, 34, of a Dodd Boulevard address in Rome, was arrested on Friday night and remained in custody at the Polk County Jail on felony and misdemeanor charges after she was discovered by clerks at the convenience store passed out in her vehicle, and parked diagonally in a handicapped spot in front of the store.

When police arrived on the scene on Friday evening, February 10, they found Hayes inside the car slumped over in the driver’s seat and was unable to get her wake up, until multiple attempts knocking on the glass and shaking the car finally roused her. By this point, she had been in the car for over 30 minutes without anyone coming in or out of the car.

EMS arrived on scene and checked her out, and Hayes told EMTs that she was diabetic and her sugar was high, but that didn’t account for why she would have passed out, which those checking out Hayes passed along to officers.

Before she refused any further treatment from EMS and while she was still in the ambulance, officers did note they believed they smelled marijuana coming from inside the car and decided to check out what was within. Their probable cause search did yield prescription drugs which included amoxicillin, gabapentin, and methadone.

One of the methadone bottles that were prescribed earlier in the day was already empty, and the other hadn’t yet been opened.

When she refused further treatment, she first asked to speak to officers and explain what happened. She told police that she had taken a friend to the Atlanta airport, and that she was headed home back to Rome at the time when she began to swerve and felt her driving was unsafe and pulled off into the gas station. She told police she was unaware she “fell asleep/passed out.”

Hayes was pressed about the prescriptions in her car and admitted the pills were hers, but said she kept the gabapentin and amoxicillin in a container together to keep her children away from the drugs. She had gotten the methadone earlier in the day.

Police decided to conduct a field sobriety test, and she was unable to pass. They believed she had used some form of marijuana, but never found any inside the car or on Hayes. They still took her into custody for driving under the influence and searched her, finding nothing at the time but warning her about the guard line rule.

After being booked into custody at the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, jail staff reported to Rockmart Police they found five additional doses of gabapentin hidden away inside of Hayes’ bra.

She faces the lone felony charge for crossing state/county guard line with weapons, intoxicants, drugs without consent, along with misdemeanor charges of driving under the influence of drugs – less safe, a sale, manufacture, deliver or possess dangerous drugs charge, and two counts of drugs not in original container.

Hayes remains in custody as of this posting on an $8,000 bond.