Oct
12
2005

don't drink and drive in the district

Random D.C. legal factoid I never knew until today: Under D.C. law, police can arrest drivers with a blood alcohol level as low as .01, which means that even a glass of wine at dinner can cause major trouble, as it did for a woman whose story is cited in today’s Post. (“Single Glass of Wine Immerses D.C. Driver in Legal Battle” - 10/12/05)

Granted, the woman’s flip responses to the officer’s questions before she was arrested probably didn’t help her case (nor did the fact that she forgot to turn her headlights on), but I’m still a bit confused about the whole thing. If D.C. police can arrest people with a blood alcohol level as low as .01, what does the “legal limit” of .08 mean, then? My vague understanding of DUI laws had been that, as long as a person was driving safely and their blood alcohol level was under the legal limit, it was legally okay for them to be behind the wheel. But obviously that’s not true.

As D.C. police officer Dennis Fair, who arrested Bolton on May 15, put it in an interview recently: “If you get behind the wheel of a car with any measurable amount of alcohol, you will be dealt with in D.C. We have zero tolerance … Anything above .01, we can arrest.” …

Although low blood alcohol arrests have been made in other states in conjunction with dangerous driving, lawyers, prosecutors and advocates of drunken driving prevention said they knew of no place besides the District that had such a low threshold for routine DUI arrests. In Maryland and Virginia, as in other states, drivers generally are presumed not to be intoxicated if they test below .05. Nationwide, .08 is the legal limit — meaning a driver is automatically presumed to be intoxicated.

(For the record, when I go out for drinks or have drinks with dinner, I generally either take the Metro to the event in question or cede driving responsibilities for the evening. But I’m still a bit taken aback by the idea that just one drink could get me in big trouble in D.C.)

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Posted at 1:40 AM in washington, dc

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After getting lots of angry calls from constituents, the D.C. City Council voted yesterday on “emergency legislation” to ease its “no tolerance” DUI policy, raising the bar at which police officers can arrest for intoxication from .01 to .05.

The changes would place alcohol levels from .05 to .079 in a “neutral zone” that would require other factors, such as sobriety field tests, to establish a driver’s impairment. The changes would bring District law in line with that of Virginia, Maryland and other states.

Three members voted against the measure, saying it was put together hastily and would not address the core problem of police officers’ abusing their discretion.

(Link found via DCist.)

Posted by alykat on October 19, 2005 9:48 AM

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