Tag Archives: DWI lawyer

Missouri has not criminalized open containers of alcohol in vehicles on state roads. The result has surprised some safety experts. Instead of an increase in highway motor vehicle fatalities, Missouri’s roads have become safer. They have become safer than other states. Federal dollars earmarked for road construction have been forced to be re-allocated toward highway safety projects in Missouri. The federal government attaches strings to its spending measures. Missouri has not complied. Missouri’s gamble has paid off. The current penalty ... Read More »

DWI enforcement in St. Louis, Missouri, has come to rely increasingly on the estimated Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC) number produced by an aging technology. The Alco-Sensor IV (ASIV), manufactured by Intoximeters, is a portable breathalyzer device used by police officers to test driver’s the police suspect are intoxicated. At 1/3 the price of other evidentiary devices, police departments love the ASIV. The other advantage St. Louis area police find in the ASIV is that it is portable. All other evidentiary ... Read More »

The effects of alcohol intoxication are relatively well-known, and they are also relatively universal among different people. The amount of alcohol concentration in one’s bloodstream that causes these effects differs among each of us (e.g. tolerance). Moreover, the amount of time it takes to experience these effects is dependent upon a number of factors such as how quickly the alcohol is consumed, the amount of food in one’s stomach, etc. Nonetheless, all states[1] in the U.S. have adopted the 0.08% ... Read More »

Officers may not particularly like recordings of traffic stops and DUI investigations—after all, who wants all their actions recorded for review by their supervisor and potentially the public? Nonetheless, body cameras are invaluable in protecting both officers and citizens during non-routine encounters because the video footage provides a complete and unbiased recordation of the full situation. In DUI cases, though, the recordings provide experienced defense counsel the opportunity to detect Constitutional violations and procedural mistakes. In particular, lawyers scrutinize the ... Read More »

United States Supreme Court decisions sometimes have a greater impact on daily life than citizens may realize. On June 23, 2016, the decision Birchfield v. North Dakota[1] changed the procedure on how law enforcement is supposed to request a blood draw from those suspected of committing a crime such as driving under the influence. The key phrase here is that it changed how law enforcement is “supposed to” handle drawing blood. As a recent news story from the Washington Post ... Read More »

Effective July 1, 2017, Tennessee is making sweeping changes to its Implied Consent Law[1] in an apparent attempt to comply with the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, Birchfield v. North Dakota, 136 S.Ct. 2160 (2016).  The Implied Consent Law and the Birchfield decision both address legal issues surrounding chemical tests to determine the alcohol and/or drug content in a person’s system. Specifically, they deal with the question of when and under what circumstances a blood or breath test may be ... Read More »

Imagine you are pulled over and suspected of driving under the influence of an intoxicant (DUI or DWI). The Officer decides he has probable cause to arrest you for DUI, and pursuant to your state’s implied consent law, he requests that you provide a sample of urine to determine the alcohol and/or drug contents in your system. Again, he specifically requests a urine test, not a breath test or a blood test to determine the amount of alcohol, prescribed medication, ... Read More »

On March 8, 2017, Utah lawmakers passed legislation to lower the legal limit for a driver’s blood alcohol level to 0.05%.[1] On March 23, 2017, Utah’s governor Gary Herbert signed the bill into law, making Utah’s DUI threshold the lowest in the nation.  The lowered blood alcohol limit will take effect in the state on December 30, 2018—just before New Year’s Eve.[2] This is a distinct and separate law from Driving While Impaired or Driving Under the Influence. Accordingly, even if the ... Read More »

On November 3, 2016, Tennessee joined the ranks of over a dozen states that have adopted a limited good faith exception to the search warrant requirement in a Tennessee DUI case that involves a warrantless blood draw.[1] A blood draw for the purpose of determining a person’s blood alcohol content is a search under the Fourth Amendment, and a warrant is required unless an exception to the search warrant requirement applies.[2] For example, some exceptions include consent to the blood ... Read More »

July 1, 2016 was a highly anticipated day for many in Tennessee: for the very first time, wine was available for purchase in grocery stores. Gliding in under the radar, perhaps because of all the hype surrounding the grocery store wine revolution, were many other changes to Tennessee’s alcohol-related criminal laws. One such legislative update changed the way that Tennessee handled a small and categorically difficult class of individuals: underage DUI defendants. These are people ages 18 to 20, who ... Read More »