Grand daughter caught a duece ...
 

I will be accompanying my 21 year old granddaughter to court tomorrow. She'll be appearing to plea on a DUI. She blew 0.14. She's a great kid. Did most of the raising of her younger brother and sisters instead of getting to be a kid herself. We now of custody of the 3 siblings and she still helps with transportation to and from school and just generally being there for the kids.

Any body able to give me some "what to expect" counsel and should I attempt to tell this story about the kids and her roll in raising them. If she goes away or loses her license it will really place a hardship on our family. Any thoughts?

Why is it they're always "a great kid"?

"Oh, my son just axe-murdered 15 people and ate their kidneys, but he's still a great kid. . ."
"My daughter is having fifty-cent's baby and she's only 14. But she's a great kid. . ."

Not trying to be an ass, but I'd hardly say someone blowing an 0.14 is a "great kid". I wouldn't lead with that in any case.

Why on earth are you going into court on a DUI without legal counsel? ABSOLUTELY a situation where someone should "lawyer up", IMO.

I am not licensed in CA but I have handled DUI's both as a prosecutor and a defense atty. While admirable, her role in raising her siblings is largely irrelevant to whether or not she is guilty of DUI. You may want to show up early and with much deference explain the situation to the prosecutor...don't be suprised if he/she looks at you with disdain. You might inquire about hardship license given her situation. Generally they know they've got you over a barrel if you don't have an attorney.

Is this her initial appearance or the actual trial? If its the IP she'll just enter a plea and a trial date will be set. I usually enter a not guilty plea and set it for trial. You can always change her plea before or even at trial

If it is the actual trial, it is likely the prosecutor will offer a deal of dropping the underlying charges (the charges that allowed them to stop her; i.e., careless driving, traffic signal, speeding etc) in exchange for a guilty plea on the DUI. He'll likely say if you take it trial she'll be found guilty of all charges, she'll do jail time/com svc, larger fine, longer license suspension, etc.

There are a number of DUI defenses: from constitutional issues (e.g., no probable cause, illegal search/seizure, etc), to evidentiary issues (e.g. chain of custody, hearsay, no authentication, etc), to technical issues (improper calibration, improper certification), to medical issues (fever can sometime cause an exxagerated reading) etc. Simply put, you'd have to be a lawyer to discover them.

Sorry I'm not much help...it really is a highly technical field. For the record, I've won 24 of 28 DUI's I've handled this year. But in all fairness, I tell people to save their money on atty fees and just pay the fine and take the hit if I feel their case is hopeless. Which is why I drive an 87 Carrera instead of a GT3R.;)

The problem with DUI's are that they are so highly political...for example MADD has monitors at every DUI trial in my jurisdiction and keeps a "report card" on judges rulings they drag out at election time. Additionally they got legislation passed that makes it a crime for a judge or prosecutor to dismiss or reduce a DUI to a lesser charge. Judges have been removed from the bench here because they played fast and loose with the law.

If she has no prior record, she more than likely will not be put in jail. She will pay a rather large fine, but put under summery probation for a few years, have to attend a first offense DUI class, lasting about three months, have to go to AA meetings and finally, her license will be suspended for a period of time, but she can get it back for work/parenting necessities. That's the short of it. A lawyer might help, since she blew double the limit. You might be able to get the court date postponed, if you decide you want to hire a private lawyer.

Oh yeah, insurance will go up for the next three years, two points on her record. As soon as she can get her license back, she will need to file a SR-22 through her ins. co. It shows proof of ins. to the DMV.

Dave

To expand on Dave's comments, if you think a dui attorney is expensive consider that here a DUI will cost you $8-10K minimum over the next 3 years: $1500 fine, $250 court costs; $300 Alchohol safety course; $5-7000 (MINIMUM) additional insurance cost over 3 years SR22 is required; $200 license reinstatement fee, $500 hardship reinstatement fee. etc etc etc.

If she proceeds on her own tomorrow, she will probably be better off pleading "no contest". She can probably cheat the high ins. fees, by dropping some coverage, but, since she has children, it may not be in her best interest.

BTW, I am NOT a lawyer, I am offering friendly advice.

Dave

Spot on. I have a lady friend who got caught DUI but was not very much over the limit. She got a good lawyer and it was a big help in her situation (single working mother of two kids) but still cost her just under $8k.

Otherwise she was looking at getting thrown in the county jail (here in Phoenix its tent city, and in a tent in the summer aint fun) for a month. As it was she paid a fine, went to school, spent one weekend and one week of nights in tent city, then her drivers license was restricted to work, shopping for food and picking up the kids for 60 days.

She learned her lesson and if she has a drink at all, its one then she heads home.

What ever you do/ she does, do not under any circumstances report the violation to your ins. co. Sometimes SR-22's are not required paper work. I personally know an individual that got convicted of DUI/DWI, lost his license for 90 days, kept up with premiums, didn't have any claims for quite awhile, and sailed under the radar for the 3 years.

A lot of people are now asking for the Source Code to the Breathalyzer(sp?) units. IIRC, judges have granted the requests, but not all the companies/states are turning it over. In one instance, the company did turn it over, and the code was chock full of bugs, incorrect programming methods and comments such as "temporary..for now..we'll fix it later." The report declared that the code wouldn't pass ANY government quality standards.

Turns out they made a lot of bad assumptions and just skipped over errors to come up with the readings.

If she's really intent on getting out of it, you could request the code, hope you get it, turn it over to someone (article I read used BaseOne Technologies) and pray to God they find something.

Just throwing it out there...

I have some experience here, though not in CA. I wouldn't show up to court without a lawyer. In VA a lot of times the judge will take your plea and tell you to come back with a lawyer in a few weeks. Most prosecutors here won't talk to you until you've paid into their good old boy network and gotten a lawyer. If it's her first offense, since she did not refuse a breathalyzer, she should be eligible for a restricted license, which will allow her to drive to and from work, school, doctor, etc. I can't believe a DUI conviction is only two points in CA. In VA you're looking at a good $15k over three yrs. with insurance, DMV and court issues. I got a tiny slap on the wrist because the cops put in a very good for me with the prosecutor and it "only" ran me about $5k over three years AND my insurance co. never found out about the whole thing. Had this gone to my insur. co., I'd have never gotten my Porsche and would probably have never discovered Pelican.

Now, if you get a good lawyer, he might be able to argue that the BAC limit and wording of the law is unconstitutional. It has worked with a judge here, who has a big problem with the law stating "A person who has a BAC of at least .08 SHALL BE PRESUMED GUILTY of driving under the influence." You can't be presumed anything. The state needs to prove it. So a few DUI defendants here have walked because the cops had nothing on them other than the BAC, usually gotten at a sobriety checkpoint, which is another Constitutional minefield. In the future, she should know to never ever submit to a breathalyzer or even field sobriety tests unless she is 110% certain she will pass. Those tests are just the state's way to gather evidence on someone they have already decided they are going to arrest. Don't help them.

There was a duo of radio personalities on 96 Rock that sold the George Stein(sp) ads. I can't remember what it was.

If I remember correctly, here in GA it is a mandatory 24 hours in jail. No ifs and or buts.

I'd say another plea is the Nolo. I'm not an attorney, not even on teh intranets.

I'm sure I'll get some flak for this, but I've always been told (and seen it firsthand) that a DUI or participation in a barfight indicates alcoholism or at the very least, propensity for alcoholism. Get her some counseling and treatment!

As Rick stated - never take the tests. You are giving the prosecuter the evidence to convict you. Why do you lose your license for refusing the tests? Couldn't one argue the 5th? '(no-one) shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself'

Way off the point, but how can a warrant compell one to give DNA or blood sample - shouldn't this fall under the 5th Ammendment?

Having a few cocktails doesn't mean you are an alcoholic.

A DUI simply means you drove under the influence and got caught, not that you were driving dangerously or improperly. Of course, being pulled over for weaving all over the road is a different situation.

The trick here is that the the loss of license is a DMV "administrative" action, not a court action and driving is a privilege, not a right. The implied consent laws in most states say that when you sign your driver's license, you are consenting to a breathalyzer if asked by a cop on a public road. The problem is that they could also expand this into car searches, which I'm surprised hasn't yet been attempted. So, you've actually waived some of your 5th Amend. rights by getting a driver's license. Same thing goes for getting a class III stamp for machine guns and silencers. You sign away some of your 4th Amend. rights.

Art, I strongly disagree with that statement. Many, if not most, first DUI's are errors in judgement. Just about anyone who drinks alcohol has driven over the limit before. Getting caught has nothing to do with your predisposition toward alcoholism. Getting caught a 2nd or 3rd time is, however, sign of a problem. If the first thumpin' you get from the court, dmv and your insurance didn't teach you, then you've got a problem.

I should add that I see downright deadly driving on a daily basis that has nothing to do with DUI and is almost always legal - cell phone chatting, putting on make-up, eating a bowl of cereal, texting, etc. DUI has a certain stigma because of MADD. I wish they would focus on more common threats like the kind of driving I mentioned above. I may see an obviously drunk driver on the road about once a year or so. Only once was it so bad that I felt the need to call it in.

Tough break for you.

Kids make mistakes. At 21, she probably has not been drinking that long, does not realize what a good stout mai tai can do to you. People do stupid things when they go from a controlled situation, to where they have much more freedom. Gain 20 lbs when they go off to college, wreck their first car, get knocked up or catch some disease because they did not use a condom, shat hippens, so to speak. Could have been worse, nobody dead from the passenger side door to a tree or anything.

Oh, and BTW, you are not refusing the test, you just want to speak to counsel first. If you are drunk and wreck your car with no witnesses, go directly to a bar and start drinking. Then when the cops get there, you can tell them you were so depressed about wrecking your car, you decided to go get drunk, since you would be taking a cab home anyway.

In NJ, a breathalyzer refusal is almost worse than a DUI conviction. Mandatory 7-12 months loss of license , for the first offense. DUI is 3 months.

Why is it that some people need a DUI before they learn this lesson?

Some folks learn by someone else's example, some learn by thinking about stuff, and some folks have to put their finger in a flame before they believe it'll burn.