As focus of a local celebrity roast more than three years ago, Monica Bristow downed six shots of Fireball whiskey while listening to several roasters, one of whom said she "drinks all the time."
And when it was Bristow's turn at the podium, she told a story about being drunk on an Amtrak train, kissing the conductor’s bald head and being threatened with police arrest.
However, one of the most controversial statements made by Bristow during the Jan. 19, 2017 roast, held as a fund-raiser for Pride, Inc. at Lewis and Clark Community College in Godfrey, was a joke she told about a retired teacher whose remains were found inside a vehicle in the Mississippi River in 2005, three years after her disappearance.
The body of teacher Wilma Bricker was identified by the coroner using dental records and X-rays, according to a report in the Quad City Times.
The news report also indicated that surveillance video showed Bricker's vehicle rolled from a lot near the Alton Belle Casino into the river in 2002. She was slumped over the wheel of her Dodge Intrepid. Searches of the river were unsuccessful at the time, but resumed three years later after sonar and ultrasound equipment used in a fishing tournament detected a vehicle on the river bottom, according to the report. A crane was used to remove the "mud-caked vehicle" out of the Mississippi.
"About Miss Bricker. I was Miss Bricker's favorite student...Miss Bricker was the one who met her end going into the river," Bristow said at the roast. ”I shouldn’t do this but I'm gonna because I've had Fireball. She had no children so they're not here."
Bristow joked that Bricker was identified by lipstick on her teeth.
"I know it's in poor taste," Bristow said, "but I love that joke. God, I love that joke."
A nephew of Bricker, Doug Jenkins, who had been quoted in the Quad City Times article after Bricker's remains were recovered declined to make a public comment.
Bristow did not return phone calls to her legislative and campaign office seeking comment.
The roast was dubbed as a "good-natured ribbing at Pride Inc.'s fourth annual Local Celebrity Roast will help raise funds to complete a circle - the State House Circle." The roast apparently evaded the attention of Bristow's Republican opponent in 2018, Mike Babcock, when Bristow first ran for office.
Bristow, who had served as president of the Riverbend Growth Association from 2003 until November 2017, was appointed to the House seat long held by state Rep. Daniel Beiser in the 111th District in December 2017.
Bristow faces Republican Amy Elik, a certified public accountant from Alton, in the general election.
Elik responded to remarks made by Bristow at the roast.
"This is a sobering reminder we need serious people in Springfield," Elik said in a statement. "Monica Bristow has consistently proven she is not that person, and we need a change in representation."