Riverside DUI

The facts about driving drunk include consideration of consequences: Punishment for Driving Under the Influence (DUI) or Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) or driving drunk, will vary, based on geographic locale and law in that state or county as well as which country you find yourself in. The potential consequences will depend upon whether or not it is the first offense, and whether various punishment enhancements may apply.

Generally, for a first offense DUI or DWI, penalties will include a fine, possible jail time or community service, a driver’s license restriction, and mandatory attendance at an alcohol and drug education program.

Why Drunk Drivers Are Dangerous: Imaging studies of the brain when it is under the influence of alcohol reveal that different areas of the brain are impaired under high and low levels of alcohol, according to a Yale study published in Neuropsychopharmacology.

“What we found is that when people were really intoxicated, they drove like they were really intoxicated and in a real vehicle,” Pearlson said. “They speeded up, especially on corners, where most people slow down, and crashed more often into other vehicles.” When mildly intoxicated, but below the legal alcohol limit, he said, the drivers seemed aware of the fact that they were impaired and corrected for the deficit. The researchers also found that alcohol had a profound effect on some, but not all, brain circuits activated in sober driving.

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The highest blood alcohol level was 0.1 and the lowest was 0.05. Drivers are considered legally drunk when their blood alcohol level is 0.08.

Here are some helpful drunk driving facts:

• One person is killed every half-hour due to drunk driving
• Each year approximately 16,000 are killed in alcohol related crashes
• Alcohol is a factor in almost half of all traffic fatalities
• Every other minute a person is seriously injured in an alcohol related crash

What Are Some Examples of DUI Penalties?
DUI punishment varies from state to state, so you’ll need to check with your lawyer to see what may apply in your particular state. Using California DUI penalties as an example, first offenders who are denied probation can expect the following:

1. 48 hours of jail time minimum.
2. 6 months driver’s license suspension
3. $340 fine

As you can see, DUI penalties are fairly harsh, even for a first offense. There are things that can factor in to a first time offense, depending on your state. Driver’s license suspension may be part of the package, but if you get probation, your state may allow you to keep your license provided you meet certain conditions set by the court. These can include rehab counseling, safe driver classes, and community service. Your lawyer will have more information, but make sure you understand what you are committing yourself to under a probation agreement. Violation of probation is taken quite seriously and can result in automatic driver license suspension and jail time.

Originally published here.

If you operate a vehicle in California, police officers can and will pull a person over anytime they are suspected of driving while intoxicated. This article briefly outlines the type of field and chemical tests that are administered by officers to determine if a person has indeed been drinking and driving.

Field Sobriety Tests

Police officers call Field Sobriety Tests “FSTs” for short. These tests consist of several exercises that measure a person’s coordination, balance and divided attention. These tests consist of exercises such as “walk the line”, saying the alphabet, one-leg-stand, walk-and-turn, horizontal gaze nystagmus (HGN) which is following an object with your eyes from side to side, etc.

Blood Alcohol Tests

In DUI cases, you’ll often hear the term “B.A.C.”, which stands for “Blood Alcohol Content”. In the state of California, you can be arrested and charged with drunk driving if your B.A.C. is over 0.08%. To find out a person’s blood alcohol content, police officers use breath analyzing machines. However, you have the option of asking for a second blood test if you want a second opinion. This second test is administered by an independent source and you have to pay for it. Police officers do not have sufficient enough training to do this type of blood test. A hospital staff will have to do the test.

Breath tests only measure alcohol and have often found to be inaccurate by DUI defense lawyers. There are many factors that can affect the result of a breath test including a person’s temperature, breath patterns, and other substances in your breath. There are several types of breath analyzing machines on the market and they must be taken care of properly to be effective. Sometimes these breath analyzing machines are not highly maintained which could bring about an incorrect B.A.C. reading.

Originally published here.

RICHARD BUSBOOM, Petitioner, v. THE SUPERIOR COURT OF SAN DIEGO COUNTY, Respondent; THOMAS E. KELLER, Real Party in Interest
Court of Appeal of California, Fourth Appellate District, Division One
December 18, 1980

The Petitioner Richard Busboom and his brother Dean were riding motorcycles when Dean was run down by Keller, driving a car in the wrong lane while drunk. The petitioner was seriously injured. He brought this lawsuit along with the parents of both boys, who however have since settled. Although the original complaint, filed October 24, 1978 alleged in general terms Keller’s willful, reckless and wanton misconduct, those allegations were not sufficient to recover punitive damages. However, after Taylor came down in August 1979, Richard sought leave to amend his complaint with appropriate allegations, and the superior court granted such leave on March 6, 1980, soon after Mau, supra, 101 Cal.App.3d 875, was decided. Petitioner brought an action against real party, which sought punitive damages. The trial court granted partial summary judgment for driver, and stuck the punitive damage claim. Petitioner injured person sought a writ of mandate ordering respondent Superior Court of San Diego County to vacate its grant of partial summary judgment striking petitioner’s claim for punitive damages in petitioner’s suit against real party in interest drunk driver.

Issues:

Whether Taylor v. Superior Court (1979) 24 Cal.3d 890 [157 Cal.Rptr. 693, 598 P.2d 854], permitting recovery of punitive damages in an appropriate drunk driving case, shall apply retroactively to accidents occurring before August 1979?

Whether the victim’s amended complaint was sufficient to claim punitive damages?

Discussion:

This court held that overruling decisions, especially in the tort field, are normally applied retroactively unless there has been great public reliance on the earlier rule, the new rule was nowhere foreshadowed, and it would be unfair to apply the rule retrospectively. Retrospective application in cases like these is not an enormous burden. It affects only cases pending, or still within the statute of limitations for such claims, when Taylor was decided. That number is not large, since the short tort statute of limitations will limit the retrospective effect to accidents occurring after August 1978, as well as all cases already filed and pending when Taylor came down. This limited effect is not an unconscionable burden on insurance companies.

This court also held the victim’s complaint, as amended, was sufficient to support a claim for punitive damages, since it specifically alleged a deliberate disregard for the safety and interest of others such as to constitute malice. The original complaint stated Keller was intoxicated as the result of his “willful acts”; he drove his pickup truck southbound in the northbound lane of the highway in reckless disregard for the safety of northbound traffic, injuring plaintiffs. The later amendment further pleaded Keller drove when intoxicated with knowledge of the safety hazard he created and was aware of the probable dangerous consequences of his conduct, which he willfully and deliberately failed to avoid. It further states Keller’s conduct shows he acted with a conscious and deliberate disregard for the safety and interest of others such as to constitute malice. It is not clear this pleading would have sufficed under the approach taken in Gombos v. Ashe, supra, 158 Cal.App.2d 517, but it is certainly sufficient under G. D. Searle & Co., supra, 49 Cal.App.3d 22, read in conjunction with Taylor. Although such a pleading might have been deemed insufficient before Taylor, we find it neither unfair nor unreasonable to permit it now, particularly because, as pointed out in Dawes, it is not clear Taylor has really changed the law as it applies to this pleading.

Conclusion:

This court hence granted the writ of mandate and ordered respondent trial court to vacate its order of summary judgment and to issue a new order denying summary judgment because punitive damages were appropriate where there was conscious disregard for safety. This court found that the actions of real party in interest drunk driver indicated a conscious disregard.

Disclaimer:

These summaries are provided by the SRIS Law Group.  They represent the firm’s unofficial views of the Justices’ opinions.  The original opinions should be consulted for their authoritative content

Originally published here.