ORANGE, Calif. (AP) — Nadia Lockyer, the estranged wife of state Treasurer Bill Lockyer and a former Alameda County supervisor, was charged with drug possession and child abuse after police found her with methamphetamine in an Orange County house where she was staying with her 9-year-old son, prosecutors said Wednesday.
The charges are the latest in a series of public substance abuse and relationship struggles faced by Lockyer, 41, who until recently was considered a rising star in Northern California government.
Bill Lockyer, 71, the state's former attorney general and current treasurer who helped his wife with campaign funding when she won her supervisor seat in 2010, has filed for divorce and is seeking joint custody of their son. She resigned from the seat in April following a string of bizarre public incidents that she blamed on chemical dependency.
Police in Orange received a tip last week that led them to a house where Nadia Lockyer was staying with relatives, district attorney's spokeswoman Farrah Emami said.
Lockyer wasn't home, but officers found methamphetamine and paraphernalia used for smoking it. Later, when they found Lockyer, she showed "objective signs" of meth intoxication and she was arrested, Emami said.
Lockyer pleaded not guilty Aug. 30 to a felony count of drug possession, two misdemeanor drug charges and one misdemeanor count of child abuse, because she is alleged to have kept the drugs in the home with her son.
She was released on her own recognizance to a drug rehab center and is due back in court Monday.
"Nadia recognizes her error and is in the process of doing everything possible to regain her health," her attorney, Allan Stokke, told The Associated Press in a phone interview.
The arrest and charges were first reported Wednesday by The Oakland Tribune.
Lockyer's troubles became public after she claimed in February that she was assaulted by a former boyfriend whom she met in a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program.
In April, an email that appeared to be sent from Nadia Lockyer went to a newspaper, accusing her husband of supplying her with drugs. He denies the claim.
"I simply can't bear this any longer. Goodbye to everyone," the note read. The newspaper, fearing for her safety, called police.
At the time, Nadia Lockyer said, "Alcoholism and addiction are diseases from which many of us suffer, and unfortunately, I have not been spared."
