DUI: Defensible or Not?
I do not condone driving under the influence, nor do I believe it’s defensible on any level. A friend, who will remain anonymous, recently asked me: what defenses are there in a DUI case? Given the recent buzz surrounding the disorderly (read: drunken) conduct of celebrities such as Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, I decided to toss this question to my LinkedIn network of professionals.
Your friend better find a lawyer and FAST. Looking on Linked In is not the way to deal with a DUI. Unless things have gotten softer since I was a delinquent minor, DUI is a criminal charge and you do not need a criminal record - it’s just one of those acquisitions people should probably forego!
There are many defenses but the best results come from lawyers who absolutely know every judge and every PD.
Chris: DUI, despite being a common and usually lower level crime, is actually fairly complicated to deal with, starting with officers observations, proceeding to how the stop was made, field tests, blood alcohol analysis and an incredible amount of paper - that’s before any lawyer even sees anything prior to making filing decisions. Each DUI case is vastly different from any other.
There are a lot of defenses, starting with establishing that there was no DUI. But, as has already been mentioned, this can’t be handled second hand over a question and answer board. Your friend needs an attorney, sooner the better.
I agree with Marc, LinkedIn is not the place to start. I gave you some links the other day for attorneys with the King county and Washington state bar based on your location. If your friend is in another area have him look at Martindales.com Also keep in mind that even if the sentence is favorable many states still allow DMV to suspend the license for a period of time over and above the courts sentence. Once you find this party a lawyer have a chat about being a responsible adult and not driving while drinking.
All of the above is right. Get a lawyer FAST! Several positions which I have recruited for recently have required a clean driving record because the position entails a company car. No matter how well qualified the candidate is in other areas, a DUI will remove them from consideration.
I am wondering why the other posters say that Linked In is not a place to look for a lawyer. Why not get a referral from this source? I agree that Linked In is probably not where you want to find your defence. Incidentally, it is true there are many defences. Many are constitutional relating to why the driver was stopped, whether he/she was provided with timely right to counsel etc. Other defences have to do with the way the testing was administered relative to the provisions of your law. Good luck.
As an attorney myself, I would agree that Linked In may be an appropriate place to find a DUI attorney, but probably not the optimal place. DUI varies drastically from state to state. And application of the law can vary considerably from county to county within a state. So quoting from Thomas Friedman in “The World is Flat,” you need “localized and specialized” expertise. In other words, find out someone who is regarded as the best or among the best in the county where this matter is pending.
Among issues to be considered would be probable cause for the stop, whether proper Miranda warnings were provided, whether the Breathalyzer equipment was proper or properly calibrated. There are standard field sobriety tests and there are questions to be asked about the propriety and administration of these. There may or may not be video evidence and there could be procedural and evidentiary issues about this.
There may be “lesser included offenses” to which the charge could be reduced. You have to consider not only the impact of the DUI on one’s criminal record but also the rights to drive to and from work. One has to consider prior offenses as that will impact on punishment in the event of conviction.
Again, I am not a criminal lawyer and this should not be considered legal advice. Rather, it is an effort to point out to you how very complex this area is. If I were a total stranger to the area, I would observe the traffic DUI court and see who is the best in the area. I would ask a retired traffic court judge who he/she considered the best to have practiced before him/her. I would ask the clerk of the court who are the regular filers for the defense in DUI cases. I would check the local bar association. Usually, if you find convergence in two or three of these areas, you will have found your best bet.
The only defense in any case, criminal or civil, is a GREAT attorney. Like it or not, the system is geared to reward those who pay for quality legal services, The facts of the case are secondary.
I guess I’ll be the lone voice in the wilderness: unless there was something unjust in the charge (i.e.: he really hadn’t been drinking), isn’t it justice that he be punished for putting the lives of others around him in danger? Thousands of people die every year because someone drinks, gets behind the wheel of a car with impaired reflexes and judgement, and gets into an accident that might have been avoided if alcohol wasn’t involved. So if your friend was drunk, and got behind the wheel of a car to drive, justice is that he be charged with DUI.
Need a new domain name? See why GoDaddy is the #1 domain registrar worldwide. Now with your domain registration, you'll get hosting, a free blog, complete email system, and much more! Plus, as a listener of The Chris Pirillo Show, enter code CHRIS3 and get your .COM domain name for just $6.95 a year. Get your piece of the internet at GoDaddy!
12 Comments
The Chris Pirillo Show
November 30th, 1999
at 12:00am
[IMG] Chris Pirillo USB Humping Dog Sony Ferrofluid Nanotech Tree DUI: Defensible or Not? Front Page Podcast on iTunes for Windows (and Mac) Tax Attorney Help Parallels 3.0 Download and Coupon Canon PowerShot TX1 Chris Heads, Chris Heads Medical Malpractice Paris Hilton Prison *** Video
Bryan Price
June 8th, 2007
at 6:30am
I know that it IS defensible, a friend of mine got off the first time he was caught. He was an alcoholic, and it did catch up with him, as he decided to take his own life within two days of his last trial — and losing his job.
Peter
June 8th, 2007
at 6:43am
Speaking as someone who was on a jury for a DUI case, if it goes to a jury it doesn’t really matter so much about the attorney unless he knows a whole bunch of loopholes that can get around the facts of the case. We had the law explained to us - and it was very clear that the person had been guilty despite his defense trying to cloud the issue several times with number of drinks in an hour (when the client was at a bar for anywhere between 4 and 6 hours), eye conditions, number of lights he “successfully” navigated, etc. Fact is that his breath test on a function machine registered insanely high and all other points were made to find the person guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
I agree with Jason on this one - if he’s actually guilty of this then I’d try to work out some lesser sentence rather than trying to plead not guilty. I rendered a fair verdict in my case and would have followed the law had there been any out for him, but I will admit to being a little annoyed that he wasted 2 days of court time, took an officer off the streets, and tied up several people in a jury when it was clear that he was guilty.
Bill @ Racine
June 8th, 2007
at 7:44am
I don’t agree that they should be able to get off the charge, unless they can prove they weren’t drunk. If a breathalyzer test was given and they failed and they were over the legal limit, then that’s that.
What people fail to remember is that they are doing nothing more than picking up a loaded gun and pointing it into a crowd and firing. A car is a weapon that can kill, especially when someone is impaired from drinking.
In my opinion, I would change the DUI or DWI penalties to attempted murder without intent.
Yes, I said and meant MURDER! If you have been drinking, you have NO right whatsoever to get behind a wheel. You are taking not only your own life, but the lives of everyone around you, into your hands when you drive while intoxicated. You don’t even have to be fall down stupid drunk to be a hazard. Even a beer or two can affect your reaction time - and those seconds can mean the difference between life and death.
If you don’t want to do the time, as they say, don’t do the crime.
Is it harsh? YOU BET!
Steve
June 8th, 2007
at 7:53am
seems to me that you never said your friend had a DUI, just was wondering on the options. Most of the responses from linkedin assume that he had a DUI already, or am I just reading it wrong?
Rick
June 8th, 2007
at 9:26am
Jason Dunn is dead-on, no puns intended.
A person might as well be running blind-folded down a busy city sidewalk waving a pair of razor sharp swords, just as easily as they are behind the wheel of a car after drinking alcohol or taking a mind-impairing drug. As far as I’m concerned, driving while chemically impaired should be considered a premeditated reckless endangerment offense at the very least, and if a by-stander is injured or killed by the offender, a premeditated attempted murder or premeditated murder charge should be brought against them.
The key question to be asked is: When the person first set out to pollute their body, did the offending person intend to drive a vehicle after they were done? If they did not provide for alternative transportation when they began to drink, it must be assumed that their intention was to drive impaired.
I can think of only one possible defense, provided that the offender is already proven to have been impaired: Proving that someone kidnapped them, tied them up, crammed the offending chemicals down their throat, or forcibly injected it in their veins, then locked them in a rolling, in-gear vehicle aimed down a public highway. In that case, the law should prosecute the kidnapping assailants for the above offenses.
Fritz
June 8th, 2007
at 4:15pm
My bestfriend just got a DUI. He was stopped at a DUI checkpoint and told the officer that he’d had a couplee of glasses of wine.
So far, he’s spent about $7,000 on attorney’s fees. He will propably lose his license for three months.
To make matters worse, he could lose his license as a — get this — drug and alcohol abuse counselor!
DUI is a serious charge. They don’t let people off easy for the first offense anymore.
Joe B
June 8th, 2007
at 4:44pm
I think if you drink, DON’T drive. If you drive, while under the influence, you should do time for it.
As a retired NYC Police Officer, I have handled too many DUI’s. Picked up too many body parts and washed down too much blood from the roads to feel sorry for anyone who gets caught driving drunk.
Lock them up!
SocioBiblog
June 9th, 2007
at 5:38am
For Attorney research, my old friend Brett Trout wrote: I would echo Kevin O’Keefe’s suggestion that you do a blog search… Related Content:Find an AttorneyAttorney SearchDUI: Defensible or Not?Kona CoffeeTax Attorney HelpCertifiable CertificationWho Am I?Fat Pipe DreamFinding a FutonHappy TagJag’ed Publishers
Ray
June 9th, 2007
at 1:03pm
From my perspective of 38 years in public safety, DUI is bad business.
If your friend already has been arrested, he needs the best attorney that
his money can buy. An expert on the particular offense preferably.
From start to finish it will probably cost him about $15,000.00 and that
is getting off cheap. That usually includes Financial Responsibility
Proof for a minimum of 5 years. Through the roof motor vehicle insurance rates for 5 to 10 years. Depending on which state he is in
it can be an over night in the lockup and bail after a few hours. If he is
not so lucky, and arrested on say a Friday night, may have to wait till
Monday morning to get out of jail and that’s not including the time a
judge could give him plus a fine of a few hundred to over a thousand
dollars. Most jails are not nice places, and some are complete hell
holes. Who would want to give up their freedom for a jail just because
they had a few too many and weren’t smart enough to get a ride home
in a taxi or from a friend.
Our state just put the screws to one of the pro football players because
even though he wasn’t driving his vehicle, he was a passenger in it and
let someone else drive drunk, so he got popped under state law for
allowing and permitting that which made him as dui as the driver under
the law.
If your friend was involved in a traffic crash and anyone was injured, he
would even be facing criminal as well as civil court down the road, again
the best thing he can do is get the absolute best lawyer he cannot
afford.
Sheila Hoffman
June 11th, 2007
at 12:47pm
Last August my husband and I were riding our tandem bike in Auburn (WA). it was a sunny day and we were brightly clothed (yellow helmets). The woman passed us at an intersection and turned right into us pushing us around the corner. She kept going. Fortunately my husband got her plate and they caught her within 15 minutes. Turns out not only was it hit and run but DUI. It was 2 in the afternoon and she was on medication AND alchohol. She had a lot of insurance which covered my medical bills (broken arm making it vehicular assault). The reason she had so much coverage? She’d just gotten her license back from a DUI the year before! She spent that night in jail but as far as I know nothing more has happend in 10 months. It hasn’t gone to trial yet. I’m with the Bill…. attempted murder isn’t too harsh!
E2001
July 24th, 2007
at 8:51pm
6+ billion people all ******** like rabbits, and nobody thinks that’s a problem! In such a world, drunk driving seems like good population control to me. It’s only a shame that more people don’t see it that way. Resources only go so far. When they’re gone, DUI won’t seem like much of an issue. But don’t take my word for it. You’ll find that out soon enough.