A UNC School of Government Blog
As part of its ongoing coverage of the John Edwards trial, The News and Observer reported today that Edwards’ lawyer cross-examined former Edwards aide Andrew Young by reading from pages of Young’s memoir “The Politician.” I’m guessing that Young’s recounting of his arrest for impaired driving in Chapter 8 of the book, fittingly titled “Men … Read more
Several earlier posts address the requirement that a defendant be notified of statutory rights related to implied consent testing before being requested to submit to a test of his breath, blood or other bodily fluid. Posts here and here address whether notification of those rights must be provided in language that the defendant understands. A … Read more
I’ve written before about the General Assembly’s enactment of G.S. 20-38.7 to prevent defendants from manipulating the procedure for appealing district court convictions to superior court in order to escape enhanced punishment in impaired driving cases based upon prior convictions. G.S. 20-38.7(c) provides that “for any implied‑consent offense that is first tried in district court … Read more
One of the purposes for sentencing for impaired driving, like sentencing generally, is to rehabilitate offenders so that they may be restored to the community as lawful citizens. Cf. G.S. 15A-1340.12. The rehabilitative aims of the sentencing scheme for impaired driving are evident in the requirement that offenders obtain substance abuse assessment at treatment as … Read more
Jeff wrote here about State v. Fields, ___ N.C. App. ___ (March 6, 2012), a case in which the officer’s observation of the defendant’s vehicle as moving within its lane “like a ball bouncing in a small room” provided reasonable suspicion for a traffic stop that culminated in an impaired driving charge. Another recent court … Read more
I ended last week’s post by noting that the date on which a prior impaired driving conviction occurs for purposes of the seven-year-look-back period in G.S. 20-179(c)(1)(a) may not be immediately obvious when a district court conviction for an impaired driving offense has been appealed to superior court and the appeal is later withdrawn. When … Read more
As most readers know, sentencing for most misdemeanor and felony convictions in North Carolina is governed by the structured sentencing provisions set forth in Article 81B of Chapter 15A of the General Statutes. See G.S. 15A-1340.10. The misdemeanor offense of impaired driving as defined in G.S. 20-138.1 and several related offenses, however, are excepted from … Read more
Since the start of the new year, I’ve been meaning to return to the court of appeals’ December 2011 opinion in State v. Clowers, __ N.C. App. __ , 720 S.E.2d 430 (2011), to explore the application of the defenses of automatism and involuntary intoxication to charges of impaired driving. Two months later, I’ve finally … Read more
The lead story in the January 30, 2012 issue of North Carolina Lawyer’s Weekly was headlined “Necessary’s Restraint: The night police officer Richard Necessary sat on a drunk-driving suspect in order to get a blood sample might prove to be the night when courts realized enough is enough.” The newspaper reported that a superior court … Read more
A recent en banc decision from the Supreme Court of Missouri adds to the growing divide among state appellate courts regarding whether the exigency created by the dissipation of blood-alcohol levels is sufficient, by itself, to render a nonconsensual, warrantless blood draw from a person arrested for impaired driving a reasonable search and seizure under … Read more