Thursday, November 14, 2024
The Latest DUI News and Information From DUI Defense Attorneys Across the Country

How Drunk is Your State?

By Ralf Steinberger from Northern Italy and Berlin [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
In an USA Today article by Cheyenne Buckingham, excessive alcohol consumption is discussed and ranked from the least-to-most excessive alcohol consumers (by State) in the United States. According to the article, excessive alcohol drinking includes “binge” drinking and “heavy” drinking. The article explains that according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) “binge” drinking is consuming four or five alcohol drinks (depending on the gender of the consumer) during a single occasion. The CDC further states that “heavy” drinking is consuming at least eight to fifteen alcohol drinks (again, depending on the gender of the consumer) on a weekly basis.

The article then lists every state in the United States in descending order from the least “drunkest” state to the most “drunkest” state. The criteria used to determine the ranking of each of the “drunkest” states is the percentage of adults drinking “excessively” (information provided to the CDC and then reviewed by the writer of the USA Today article). Nationwide, as the article explains, 18.0% of American adults drink an excessive amount of alcohol.

According to the rankings, the least “drunkest” State in the United States is Tennessee where only 11.2% of the adults drink alcohol to an excess while North Dakota tops the list with 24.7% of the adults drinking alcohol to an excess. Obviously, the article demonstrates that excessive alcohol drinking remains a major problem in the United States. The article does not address driving under the influence/driving while impaired (DUI) cases, but obviously, one should not drink to excess and then attempt to drive. If you or anyone you know has an alcohol consumption problem, please seek help before hurting yourself, or others.

About the Author: Steven Oberman has been licensed in Tennessee since 1980, and successfully defended over 2,500 DUI defendants.  Among the many honors bestowed upon him, Steve served as Dean of the National College for DUI Defense, Inc. (NCDD) and currently serves as chair of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers DUI Committee.  Steve was the first lawyer in Tennessee to be Board Certified as a DUI Defense Specialist by the NCDD.

He is the author of DUI: The Crime & Consequences in Tennessee, updated annually since 1991 (Thomson-West), and co-author with Lawrence Taylor of the national treatise, Drunk Driving Defense, 8th edition (Wolters Kluwer/Aspen).  Steve has served as an adjunct professor at the University of Tennessee Law School since 1993 and has received a number of prestigious awards for his faculty contributions.  He is a popular international speaker, having spoken at legal seminars in over 30 states, the District of Columbia and three foreign countries.

The author would like to thank his law partner, Arrin “AZ” Zadeh, for his contributions to this article.

If you would like to contact the author, please visit: http://www.tndui.com

 

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Steve Oberman

Since graduating from the University of Tennessee Law School in 1980, Mr. Oberman has become established as a national authority on the intricacies of DUI defense law. Steve is a former Dean of the National College for DUI Defense, co-author of a national treatise ("Drunk Driving Defense" published by Aspen/Wolters-Kluwer), and author of "DUI: The Crime and Consequences in Tennessee" (published by Thomson-Reuters/West). He has taught thousands of lawyers, judges, and members of the general public about the intricacies of this crime. Steve was selected as a Fulbright Scholar to teach American Criminal Law and American Trial Advocacy at the University of Latvia School of Law in 2019; in 2023 taught for a semester as a visiting professor at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) Faculty of Law in Budapest, Hungary; and as a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Ljubljana Faculty of Law in 2024. Steve has also presented at a number of judicial conferences in the United States and Canada as well as for law enforcement agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Czech Republic Police Academy. As a Tennessee DUI attorney, Mr. Oberman has successfully defended over two thousand clients charged with Driving Under the Influence of alcohol and/or drugs. In 2006, Mr. Oberman became the first DUI lawyer in Tennessee to be recognized by the National College for DUI Defense as a Board Certified Specialist in the area of DUI Defense law.

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