Driving While Allegedly Under the Influence? Laguna Cops Say "Gotcha!"

Michael Tomson, who co-founded the surfwear clothing brand Gotcha in 1978 in a Laguna Beach garage, was arrested here Monday morning after a traffic accident the 58-year-old was involved in.

Laguna Beach police say Tomson rear-ended a Nissan at a stop sign while driving his Mercedes at Glenneyre and Calliope streets. The woman in the Nissan suffered minor injuries, but Tomson was unhurt. He was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence and possession of a controlled substance (cocaine).

Tomson posted a $100,000 bond and was released.

This isn't the first time Tomson has had run-ins with the law. Within the past two years, he's plead guilty to DUI and resisting an officer.

The Gotcha brand, for a time during the '80s, was one of the biggest surfwear labels around, known as much for its style -- they were responsible for bringing back the long-cut boardshort, according to Matt Warshaw's book The History of Surfing -- as its edgy marketing campaigns. But after selling 40 percent of the company ownership to Merrill Lynch, Warshaw says, "its cool quotient was in free fall."