>Anecdote earmuffs on/
>In my experience in the ER, if there’s any gap between the event and the presentation […]
A friend of mine was rear ended by a drunk who fled the scene on foot to a bar a few hundred feet up the road, where he drank heavily. This protected him from prosecution for DUI. I don’t know if doing so was some kind of strategy, maybe based on experience, or if he was acting without any planning and got lucky.
>earmuffs off
I recall an old episode of The Practice in which a drunk driver smashed into another car. While waiting for the cops he called his lawyer who, after asking if he had any alcohol in the car and learning that he had, advised him to start drinking it and to keep drinking until the police arrived. The lawyer then argued in court that his client had been so shaken by the accident he had drunk a considerable amount while standing by his vehicle awaiting the police. This introduced enough doubt about his level at the time of the accident to get the case dismissed.
Could this really happen or is this just TV fantasy?
I have never seen “The Practice” but I remember an episode of quincy where the guilty party in a car wreck went to a bar and proceeded to get drunk. He also had a minor injury where a hematoma devloped, sequestering the blood. Quincy did a blood analysis and determine the guy was drunk at the time of the accident.
So if I am sitting on my front porch drinking with friends, I can be arrested for DUI because my keys are in my pocket and over there in the driveway is my vehicle?
Wasn’t Quincy an M.E.? Did someone die?
Hardly seems likely, does it?
Doesn’t this leave him open to “leaving the scene of an accident” charges?
>Doesn’t this leave him open…
I suppose it must. And I don’t know which charges would be a bigger problem, or if they would depend on his history. I am also afraid I don’t remember what legal resolution there was in the case. My friend was hospitalized for a few days with, IIRC, a concussion and some other lesser problems, and her car was ruined, and the legal system had the guy (I think his car was undriveable and so identified him even though he himself ran off). But I can’t remember what, if anything, became of him.
Many years ago, I knew a guy who flipped his car into a ditch. He and his passengers promptly fled the scene. I distinctly remember the police coming by to find him that night. They never found him. He had run off with his freinds to a “safe haven” and sat the night out. He said it was the smartest thing he ever did. Sure they charged him with fleeing the scene of an accident. No doubt everyone knew they had to have been drinking to flip the car and flee. Nevertheless, they could not charge him with DUI because nobody would testify that they had been drinking that night and there was no way to prove it.
This guy was a richy rich, so I imagine the quality of lawyer he retained had alot to do with his squeeky clean gettaway. Yet another reason to tax the wealthy at a higher rate.
Actually, the hematoma proved the guy wasn’t (significantly) drunk at the time of the collision. It was actually a premeditated murder with the guy knowing the DUI laws in California were a joke (or so the episode claimed - the series was big on ill-informed social commentary) so he could kill a business rival (I forget what the exact relationship was), get tanked immediately afterward, and get a wrist-slap for a drunk-driving-causing-death charge.
It could, but it would be far better to have that, than have a DUI on your record.
Plus you could use the old “I don’t remember what happened. All I remember was the horrible sounds of metal crunching, I had a panic attack, and the next thing I know, the police had found me in a bar”.
No. I mean take RIGHT NOW for instance. My car keys are sitting right beside me on the computer desk. I turn 90 degrees, look out my window and see my vehicle.
If I was currently drinking, and was above .08 BAC, is the previous poster or anyone actually saying that I could be charged with DUI while in my home since it is possible that I could drive?
I understand. I’m agreeing with you, or at least with what I perceive to be the spirit of your question. It doesn’t seem likely to me that sitting on your porch and having a few beers with your keys in your pocket constitutes DUI simply because your car is in sight.
Bryan Ekers, thanks, that was the episode i was thinking about, just didn’t have all the facts correct.
jtgain, yes it looks like the law is “skating on a slippery slope of thin ice.” 
A couple more supporting anecdotes:
Friend of mine hit a car while driving home from a party. He left the scene, went home, the cops showed up an hour later. Was charged with hit and run, but not DUI. I have been told numerous times that this is the right decision.
A group of my friend were once drinking in a dorm room. It got late, and they wanted to listen to music, so they went out to one of their cars so as not to disturb anyone. The person sitting in the drivers seat was charged with DUI (actually minor in posession operating a motor vehicle, as his BAC was below .08). As he related the story to me, the key factor was that his keys were in the ignition and the car was on (but not running, just the stereo.) He got a hot shot lawyer and got it reduced to a regular MIP.
Unless you’ve been nailing a policeman’s wife or something, I just don’t see this happening. But even if it did, I think the check-and-balance here is the courts. Any judge would dismiss your case in 3 seconds flat and tear the cop a new one for wasting his time.
The semantics are there for situations like an officer coming across a vehicle in a ditch and the driver standing nearby or attempting to flee. The drunk can’t claim he’s off the hook because the cop didn’t actually see him driving.
Trust me, they cannot charge anyone with a DUI when they have “successfully” fled the scene.
Friday night we were hit on I-95 by a man doing over 100mph, he flipped his car and crushed it. Even with my injuries, I ran to see if he was OK. He climbed out of the broken glass, pushed me down and yelling in my face. I am a CCRN, and testify as an expert witness for the States Attorney in my local venue. I am not an officer of the court. I could smell ETOH on his breath, and knew he was drunk from his mannerisms.
He ran into the woods and evaded police for four hours, until finally arriving at our local emergency to see - guess who ------ yeah ME. He was immediately detained. He was arrested and charged with multiple traffic violations, including fleeing the scene of an injury accident. His BAL was 1.28 - now remember this is four hours after the accident.
NADA - nothing - no officer of the court saw him physically behind the wheel of this car, even though he has admitted he was driving. He is still not being charged with DUI/DWI. What a crock.
Just be glad not all crimes are treated with the “kit” gloves drunk driving is, otherwise I got go rob a store at gunpoint and say later - I have no idea how that merchandise got in the back of the car. You can’t prove I was in the store.
Help me here??? How does the hematoma prove that the guy wasn’t drunk? Drunk people fall ALOT and get hematoma regularly, don’t see the connection. You can be drunk and have a bruised brain too???
Nope. If you are dead drunk, have tons of witnesses, leave the scene, and the cops find you at your house a few minutes later, they can’t test you there. The argument is that no matter what your blood alcohol measurement is, it might have been lower (and thus legal) earlier. Maybe you drank a lot but it didn’t disperse into your system yet. Maybe you drank more when you got home.
I recall a case few years ago around here where some politician crashed his SUV and ran off. Next day they arrested him or he turned himself in, but no DWI charge just fleeing and damages. There was very strong suspicion he was drunk out of his gourd.