December 14, 2021
S.L. 2021-182 (S 183) enacted significant changes to the laws that require certain persons convicted of driving while impaired to have ignition interlock installed on their vehicles. Those changes include: […]
May 19, 2020
My colleagues and I usually spend the waning weeks of May slogging through months of appellate opinions, determining which cases merit discussion at upcoming summer conferences. This year, of course, […]
January 22, 2020
The North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission released last November a report recommending several changes to the state’s impaired driving laws and correctional policies. The report marked the culmination […]
June 13, 2018
Two recent North Carolina Court of Appeals opinions help delineate when an officer has probable cause to believe a driver is driving while impaired. In each case, the court of […]
March 6, 2017
In Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (2009), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that an officer may “search a vehicle incident to a recent occupant’s arrest only […]
October 13, 2016
Today’s post is a return to the Sentencing Whiteboard, this time to explain active sentences for aggravated level one DWI. As Shea and I have discussed in earlier posts (here, here, […]
August 22, 2016
The penultimate episode of the inaugural season of Beyond the Bench is now available! The first half of the episode was produced by Shea, and explores the penalties associated with impaired […]
April 20, 2016
The United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments this morning in three cases involving the chemical testing of impaired drivers. The question before the court in each case is whether, […]
August 19, 2015
The Wall Street Journal published an opinion piece last Friday that, according to the headline, offered “A Simple Fix For Drunken Driving.” I was intrigued because, frankly, I didn’t think […]
April 23, 2014
The Supreme Court just decided a case that significantly changes North Carolina law regarding whether a traffic stop can be made based on an anonymous 911 call alleging bad driving. […]