Aurora

Video Shows Aurora School Bus Driver Drinking Beer While Driving Kids: Police

The bus company reported video showed the driver drinking from two beer cans on Nov. 15 while picking up students

A suburban school bus driver was arrested after she allegedly purchased beer at a convenience store and drank it while picking up students during a morning route.

Michelle Passley, 44, was charged with two misdemeanor counts of endangering the life and health of a child after video from an Aurora school bus showed her placing a beer can into a brown paper bag and drinking from it while driving “numerous elementary school children.”

Authorities said a manager from the First Student Bus Company came to the Aurora Police Department to report a driver after an “observant convenience store clerk” called East Aurora School District 131 and said they watched a woman who purchased a beer from the store get onto a school bus and drive away.

The bus company reported video showed the driver drinking from two beer cans on Nov. 15 while picking up students. In total, 32 students were on the bus on the morning of the incident, police said.

Detectives later determined Passley picked up the school bus around 6 a.m. and completed one route before stopping as a gas station in the 900 block of North Farnsworth Avenue and purchasing two cans of beer and continuing to drive.

The driver was terminated by the bus company and the school district contacted the Illinois Department of Child and Family Services, according to authorities.

Passley was arrested Monday evening and released on $100 bond. She is expected to appear in court again on Dec. 27.

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