A Statesboro Police officer who heard a “loud grinding noise”  while assisting another officer with a traffic stop looked up to see a man driving a car with no front tires on Veteran’s Memorial Parkway Saturday night.
    The driver, who was found to be intoxicated, told police he hit something and kept on driving, thinking he could make it home, said Statesboro Police Capt. Wendell Turner.
    Officer Justin Weinmann ended up charging Joseph Aaron Yeater, 28, Sandpiper Drive, with DUI, operating an unsafe vehicle, driving without a license on his person — and tire requirement violations, according to reports.
    Weinmann was working backup with another officer on Veteran’s Memorial Parkway when he “heard a loud grinding noise and saw a 1994 white Honda Accord pass by with no front tires,” Turner said. 
    He stopped the driver, Yeater, near Statesboro Place Circle. Field sobriety tests indicated Yeater was under the influence of alcohol.
    Marks in the pavement were found along the parkway and a good distance along Ga. 67, “past Joe Hodges’ Hill,” Turner said.
    Yeater told police he had struck something that “appeared to be a chrome front bumper” in the roadway, but officers investigating his claim did not find a bumper or anything else Yeater may have struck with his car.
    He hit something, however, Turner said. Whatever he struck or ran over punctured both front tires, and Yeater drove on the deflated tires until the rubber fell off the rims, then drove on the bare rims, he said. “We don’t know what he actually hit.”
    Yeater was taken to the Bulloch County Jail where he later posted bond, according to jail records. The car was towed.