Drive drunk, lose your license. Drive drunk four times in a year? Lose your freedom.

A Kittanning man is heading to state prison for his behavior behind the wheel after his fourth DUI arrest in just eight months this past spring.

“Alcohol messed me up,” Joshua Sol Heigley told Judge William Shaffer on Wednesday after being sentenced to up to five years in prison.

A state trooper in March clocked 35-year-old Heigley going 101 mph in a 55 mph zone on Route 422 east of Bonniebrook Road.

The trooper pulled him over and discovered Heigley's two young children in the back seat, one of whom was not secured in a child safety seat, according to charging documents.

Police arrested Heigley for suspicion of driving under the influence. Additionally, he was charged with 24 criminal and traffic offenses resulting from the March arrest.

Authorities charged Heigley with felony DUI because of a new state law enacted last fall that elevates a misdemeanor DUI charge to a felony if a driver is arrested more than three times in 10 years for the offense.

The March arrest was Heigley's fourth DUI in less than a year.

Proponents of the new law called for harsher legal consequences for repeat offenders like Heigley.

Previously, all DUIs in the state were treated as misdemeanors.

He pleaded guilty July 22 to DUI, endangering the welfare of children and driving with a blood-alcohol content greater than 0.02 with a suspended license.

Shaffer sentenced Heigley to 18 months to five years in prison. He also ordered him to pay $3,500 in fines and serve 150 hours of community service.

“Joshua had a very rough year,” said Heigley's attorney, Chad Ostrosky. “A cycle of alcoholism and substance abuse led him here.”