DWI / DUI

Here is an overview of events leading to my recent trial win for a 0.14 blood draw case in Virginia General District Court. GDC: The police officer testified to seeing my client’s car stuck in a ditch, and my client’s saying he drove the car and nothing to drink...

During the year between college and law school, I was a financial auditor at one of the nation’s then-thirty largest banks. We reviewed the bank’s financial activities to assure the bank was adhering to safe and sound financial practices. This was the closest I ever came...

All battles have hurdles. For Virginia drunk driving defense, last December the state’s intermediate appellate court threw a King Kong-sized hurdle for challenging the accuracy of the breathalyzer machines, in the form of Fitzgerald v. Com, 61 Va. App. 279, 734 S.E.2d 708 (2012). Fitzgerald does...

On April 17, 2013, the Supreme Court issued a splintered opinion in which a 5-4 majority ruled that nonconsensual blood draws ordinarily require a search warrant in driving while intoxicated investigations and arrests. Missouri v. McNeely, ___ U.S. ___ (April 17, 2013). McNeely says that...

NOTE: Today’s blog entry only addresses matters in Virginia state courts. A Virginia drunk driving/DWI conviction, at minimum, brings one year of suspended driving with the option to apply for restricted driving privileges, payment to complete alcohol education, and a fine and court costs. Jail...

Another reason to fight DWI cases tooth and nail In The Forty Year Old Virgin, one of the hero’s drunk prospects asks him to blow into a tube into her car, and away they recklessly go. He did not at the time realize that he...

Canada/the Great White North has many great places to visit. Beyond its cities is much natural beauty and a much lower average population per square mile than the United States. Quebec and Ontario are pleasant drives from my home. Get a drunk driving/DWI/DUI conviction (and numerous...

Last year, I blogged about a 6-5 Virginia intermediate appellate court opinion affirming a drunk driving conviction where the DWI was allegedy committed on private property not used as a thoroughfare, and not committed in the presence of a police officer. Today, Virginia’s highest court...

Particularly now that Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, 129 S.Ct. 2527 (2009), has become firmly entrenched in the Constitutional landscape, Sixth Amendment challenges to machine-based speed calculations should be more persuasive than ever when the people who calibrated the machine do not testify live at trial. Virginia, for instance, has...

An officer arrested a man for DWI on private property, and was not sure whether he would mention the possibility of taking a breathalyzer test, not knowing whether Virginia’s implied consent law for taking a breathalyzer test applied. After the defendant’s arrest but before the...