KENNEDY SAYS MEDICATIONS A FACTOR IN D.C. CAR ACCIDENT

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) denied through his office
Thursday that he had been drinking before his car crashed into a
Capitol Hill security barricade at 2:45 a.m. Thursday.

"I consumed no alcohol prior to the incident," he said in a
statement. "I will fully cooperate with the Capitol Police in
whatever investigation they choose to undertake."

In a longer statement issued later, Kennedy said that on Wednesday
night he had taken sleep medication and a prescription anti-nausea
drug that can cause drowsiness.

Then early Thursday "I drove the few blocks to the Capitol Complex
believing I needed to vote," his second statement said, according to
The Associated Press. "Apparently, I was disoriented from the medication."

The youngest of three children of Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and
his ex-wife, Joan Bennett Kennedy, confirmed he was in an accident
near the Capitol.

Roll Call, a Capitol Hill newspaper, was the first to report the
incident Thursday, quoting a letter from a police union official
urging an investigation into whether the congressman received
preferential treatment. According to the letter, the car, which had
its headlights off, narrowly missed a Capitol Police cruiser and
smashed into the barricade.

"The driver exited the vehicle and he was observed to be staggering,"
wrote Greg Baird, acting chairman of the U.S. Capitol Police's
chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police.

Officers approached the driver, who "declared to them he was a
congressman and was late to a vote. The House had adjourned nearly
three hours before this incident. It was Congressman Patrick J.
Kennedy from Rhode Island."

The union official wrote that the officers were not allowed to
perform basic field sobriety tests and that the watch commander on
duty "ordered all of the patrol division units to leave the scene."

Kennedy was then driven home, according to some accounts.

Kennedy, 38, was treated in 1986 for abusing cocaine.

More recently, in 2000 he acknowledged that he was "on a lot of
different medications for, among other things, depression."