It could happen to me or you. State and national news sources are finally reporting an undo number of sober drivers who are being wrongfully arrested for DUI. I don’t often relate what happens to my own clients, but it is simply tragic that one of my clients who was stopped by a police officer for having an expired registration was ultimately arrested for DUI.
The Facts: The license plate on the vehicle was out of date, so the officer had a legal right to stop the vehicle. Interestingly, the vehicle was registered in someone else’s name. My client was using it with the owner’s permission. My client was cooperative with the officer and did admit to consuming some beer. However, my client did not have slurred speech, or any other indicator of impairment. In fact, he performed very well on the field sobriety tests. The problem was an overzealous officer.
My client was arrested, placed in the back of a patrol vehicle, and taken to a hospital where a blood sample was extracted. My client was then placed in jail for hours. He then had to make bond, hire me to defend him, lose time from his activities to appear in court, and wait weeks for the blood test result to be returned. Other suspects have even had to pay for an ignition interlock device which is required by law in certain circumstances.
The Blood Test Results: In my case, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Crime Laboratory results reported that there was no alcohol in my client’s system. Further tests were then requested by the prosecution to determine if my client was under the influence of prescribed medication or other drugs. More weeks elapsed only to have the additional testing reveal that there were no intoxicant in his system.
The Consequences: The worst thing, though, is that my client, who had no criminal or traffic record of any kind now has his information entered in the National Crime Information Center. The NCIC is a computerized index of criminal justice information overseen by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. This means that when my young client starts to apply for a job, certain potential employees will note that he was arrested. Despite the case being dismissed, this will certainly hinder his ability to obtain certain types of employment in the future—even if these matters are expunged.
Other Cases: This case is not isolated. The news media, such as WEAU TV in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, are reporting similar cases across Tennessee. They broadcasted that Nashville TV station WSMV TV reported that there were 609 sober drivers arrested for DUI in Tennessee between 2017 and 2024. That is a lot of innocent people going to jail! A similar story was also reported by Knoxville, Tennessee station, WVLT-TV. These reports demonstrate that not everyone arrested for DUI is guilty.
Conclusion: To be clear, there is no doubt that driving under the influence is a serious offense and that too many people are injured or killed due to those who commit this preventable crime. However, while officers should remain diligent in enforcing this law, officers need to be better educated and need to employ better techniques to detect this offense. As I have argued for years, it is imperative that we keep drunk drivers off the road, but let’s not go overboard by arresting innocent people. It is just as much a tragedy to arrest innocent people who must live with having an arrest record on computer records for the rest of their lives. Even expunged records remain on non-public law-enforcement computers.
About the Author: Steven Oberman has been licensed in Tennessee since 1980, and successfully defended over 2,500 DUI defendants. Steve was the first lawyer in Tennessee to be Board Certified as a DUI Defense Specialist by the National College for DUI Defense, Inc. (NCDD). Among the many honors bestowed upon him, Steve has served as Dean of the NCDD and currently serves as chair of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers DUI Committee.
He is the author of DUI: The Crime & Consequences in Tennessee, updated annually since 1991 (Thomson-West), and co-author with Lawrence Taylor (1942 – 2023) of the national treatise, Drunk Driving Defense, 9th 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 30 states, the District of Columbia and 10 foreign countries. After being named a Fulbright Scholar, Steve was honored to teach as a Visiting Professor at the University of Latvia Faculty of Law (Law School) in the capital city of Riga, Latvia for a semester during 2019. In 2023, Steve accepted an offer to teach for a semester as a Visiting Professor at Eötvös Loránd University Faculty of Law in Budapest, Hungary. Steve was designated a Fulbright Scholar for a second time and taught American Criminal Law and American Trial Advocacy at The University of Ljubljana Faculty of Law in the capital city of Ljubljana, Slovenia for the 2024 spring semester. Since then, Steve taught American Trial Advocacy to Masters Students in Criminal and Criminal Procedure Law for the Winter Semester in 2025 at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Faculty of Law in Madrid, Spain. If you would like to contact the author, please visit his website at www.tndui.com.
