DWI arrests in North Carolina’s capital city are on the rise. The Wake County district attorney’s office expects to prosecute around 7,000 DWI cases this fiscal year—2,000 more than it handled in 2013-14. The increased arrests result from beefed up patrol activity made possible by federal grants. And there is some speculation that the decline in fatal alcohol-related accidents in Raleigh from the previous year may be related to the additional arrests. Yet people continue to drive while impaired in Raleigh and elsewhere in North Carolina, sometimes with tragic consequences. And every DWI charge adds a court case to an already crowded district court docket. I wonder: Can we prosecute away the risks posed by impaired drivers?
Motor Vehicles
Are Driver’s License Revocations on the Agenda?
The 2015 North Carolina General Assembly convened earlier today, with new members sliding into place just as the first ice storm of the winter left the area. And while most folks’ attention will (as usual) be focused on the state budget, I’ll be watching over the next few months for legislation related to motor vehicle crimes. I’m particularly curious to see whether the General Assembly shows any interest in interrupting the cycle of driver’s license revocation, an issue that lately has attracted national attention.
Failing to advise a defendant of his implied consent rights requires suppression of the test results . . . except when it doesn’t
In opinions spanning four decades, North Carolina’s appellate courts have suppressed chemical analysis results in impaired driving cases based on statutory violations related to their administration. When the violation consists of the State’s failure to advise a defendant of her implied consent rights, the appellate courts’ jurisprudence has been straightforward and consistent: The results of an implied consent test carried out without the defendant having first been advised of her implied consent rights are inadmissible. Indeed, the court of appeals reaffirmed that principle last June in State v. Williams, __ N.C. App. ___, 759 S.E.2d 350 (2014), holding that the State’s failure to re-advise the defendant of his implied consent rights before conducting a blood test under the implied consent statutes required suppression of the test results. A court of appeals opinion issued in the waning hours of 2014 indicates, however, that the rule is subject to at least one exception.
DWLR + DWI Does Not (Automatically) Equal a Grossly Aggravating Factor
Author’s note: The law was amended in 2015 to alter this analysis. The amendments are discussed here.
Grossly aggravating factors matter in DWI sentencing. And there’s one factor that seems to be confusing folks, particularly when it comes to ignition interlock violations. Here’s hoping this post clears it up.
United States Supreme Court Rules that Reasonable Suspicion May Be Based on Reasonable Mistakes of Law
Shea blogged here about State v. Heien, the case in which the court of appeals ruled that having one burned-out brake light was not a violation of G.S. 20-129 and so did not support a vehicle stop. (The stop led to a consent search of the defendant’s vehicle, which led to the discovery of drugs and to drug trafficking charges.) The prosecution sought review in the state supreme court. That court assumed that the court of appeals was correct about the scope of the statute but determined (1) that an officer might reasonably think otherwise, given ambiguities in the statute, and (2) that reasonable suspicion may be based on a reasonable mistake of law. Conclusion (2) was the subject of a split of authority across the country, so the United States Supreme Court agreed to review the case. It issued its opinion yesterday.
Go Ahead, Test Me
Most people stopped on suspicion of impaired driving would rather avoid the trip to the police station. Some suspects attempt to dispel officers’ suspicions by answering questions about whether they have been drinking and how much they’ve had to drink. Others perform field sobriety tests. A few cut right to the chase, demanding that officers transport them immediately to the station for breath testing. That way, the person who is not impaired by alcohol can resolve the encounter without the indignity–and the record–that accompanies arrest.
Keeping a Good Thing Going: New Book Available on Impaired Driving Laws
The School of Government has been publishing reference books on motor vehicle law since 1947. The twelfth iteration of a book on motor vehicle law and the law of impaired driving, written by Ben Loeb and Jim Drennan was published in 2000. The book went out of print a few years ago, though you’ll find dog-eared copies of it in many offices, including mine. I’m happy to report that a new book in this series now is available: The Law of Impaired Driving and Related Implied Consent Offenses in North Carolina.
Hospitalization of DWI Suspect Does Not Create Per Se Exigency Justifying Warrantless Blood Draw
The Chatham County sheriff’s deputy who arrested Ronald McCrary in Siler City for impaired driving at 7:34 p.m. on December 28, 2010 decided that if McCrary was taken to the hospital, he would obtain a sample of his blood without a warrant. McCrary was in fact taken to a nearby hospital—at his insistence—where he refused to cooperate with the medical staff and refused to consent to the withdrawal of his blood. Once the hospital discharged McCrary at 9:13 p.m., several officers restrained him while hospital staff withdrew his blood. Was the blood draw legal?
Implied Consent Laws Can’t Provide End-Run around McNeely
The United States Supreme Court held in Missouri v. McNeely, 133 S. Ct. 1552 (2013), that the natural dissipation of alcohol in the bloodstream does not constitute an exigency in every impaired driving case that justifies a warrantless, nonconsensual blood draw. In so holding, the court rejected the state’s call for a categorical rule—based solely on the evanescent nature of alcohol—that would authorize warrantless blood draws over a defendant’s objection whenever an officer has probable cause to believe the defendant has been driving while impaired. Some states have continued to argue, however, that nonconsensual warrantless blood draws in impaired driving cases are categorically permissible based on implied consent laws enacted by their state legislatures. Two state supreme courts recently rejected such arguments, holding that implied consent statutes in Nevada and Idaho that do not allow a driver to withdraw consent to testing are unconstitutional. That reasoning might be applied to invalidate the provision of North Carolina’s implied consent law that categorically allows the warrantless testing of unconscious drivers.
Does Graduated Licensing Make Teens Safer Drivers or Just Postpone the Risk?
Vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for teenagers in the United States. That’s why states no longer grant unrestricted driver’s licenses to teens once they turn 16, as they did when I was a kid. Instead, states grant driving privileges to teenagers under 18 only after they have been driving under a permit with supervision for a lengthy period of time, and, even then, only by degrees. Driver’s licenses issued to such teens typically restrict nighttime driving and/or the number of minors who may be present in the vehicle for some period of time after initial licensure. While many people readily accept the notion that teens are safer during the graduated licensing period–either because they aren’t driving unsupervised at night, because they don’t have a gaggle of friends in the car, or because they aren’t driving at all given the hassle associated with becoming licensed–they wonder whether the effects vanish once the teens are on their own.