A Fight on Christmas Night

A Christmas night dispute in Springs ended with a Montauk man under arrest on multiple charges, including aggravated drunken driving, reckless endangerment, and assault, all misdemeanors, as well as a felony charge of unlicensed driving.

The assault, East Hampton Town police said, occurred on School Street. According to police, Luis Daniel Vargas, 29, was leaving a party on Gardiner Avenue with his girlfriend, Luz Tangarife, when the two began to argue over who would drive her 2014 Toyota Tundra back to their Montauk apartment. Ms. Tangarife told police that Mr. Vargas had been drinking. Mr. Vargas has had his driving privileges revoked or suspended numerous times, police said, and his license has never been restored.

The argument escalated, with Ms. Tangarife, who had initially gotten behind the wheel, pulling up at the Springs-Fireplace Road and School Street intersection and getting out of the vehicle, she told police. Mr. Vargas then drove away. Ms. Tangarife called a friend, Victoria Montoya, who agreed to come and pick her up.

According to Ms. Montoya, when she and her husband found Ms. Tangarife, Mr. Vargas returned, pulling into a driveway. “He looked angry,” Ms. Montoya said in her statement to police. “His fists were clenched. They started fighting and wrestling on the ground.”

Ms. Montoya, seeking to calm Mr. Vargas down, said she began to open her door. “As I was getting out of the car, Daniel slammed the door closed, and it hit me on the head.”

Semiconscious, with a large swelling on her head, she was taken to Southampton Hospital, where police interviewed her. In the meantime, Mr. Vargas had gotten back in the truck and driven away.

When police learned the identity of Ms. Montoya’s alleged assailant, they began looking for the truck, with a particular focus on Montauk Highway between Napeague Meadow Road and Old Montauk Highway, where it is impossible to drive east to Montauk and bypass the highway.

About a half-hour later, an officer spotted Mr. Vargas and pulled him over near Old Montauk Highway. Mr. Vargas still appeared agitated, police said, and refused to take roadside sobriety tests, but he did cooperate once he was told he was under arrest on charges of misdemeanor assault and drunken driving.

He was taken to headquarters in Wainscott, where he took the Intoxilyzer 9000 breath test, allegedly producing a reading of .18 of 1 percent, high enough to trigger the heightened misdemeanor charge of aggravated driving while intoxicated. He reportedly told police he had had a bottle of wine. “I am very sorry,” he is quoted as saying. “I am a little drunk.”

“Your privileges to operate a motor vehicle were already suspended, yet you allegedly were driving,” East Hampton Town Justice Steven Tekulsky said during Mr. Vargas’s arraignment on Friday morning. “If true, that says to me that you place your interests ahead of those of society.” Justice Tekulsky set bail at $2,500, which was posted.

Animal Cruelty Charge

Mr. Vargas’s legal problems go beyond the current charges. In June 2011, he was arrested by detectives from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and charged with kicking and beating his 6-month-old bulldog near his apartment on West Lake Drive. The detectives had obtained a video of the incident, leading to Mr. Vargas’s arrest on a felony charge of cruelty to animals.

At the time, Justice Lisa R. Rana set bail at $10,000. In January 2012, Mr. Vargas agreed to plead guilty to the cruelty charge at the misdemeanor level. Justice Rana sentenced him in March of that year to three years’ probation, and he was ordered to perform 280 hours of community service. While the community service portion of his sentence is finished, he is a couple of months shy of completing his probationary period.

“The odds are pretty good that they are going to file a violation of probation,” Justice Tekulsky warned Mr. Vargas Friday. Such a charge would send Mr. Vargas back in front of Justice Rana for a possible resentencing on the cruelty-to-an-animal conviction from 2012.

After Mr. Vargas’s arrest in 2011, the bulldog was taken from him and placed in a new home, according to S.P.C.A. statements made at the time.