I’ve lately developed a taste for O’Douls Amber, which reminds me of Heineken Dark without the nasty side effects. It contains less than one-tenth the alcohol of my usual poisons. Seeing as how I would have to drink a case of the stuff to catch even a slight buzz, I enjoy drinking it while driving as change of pace from the usual diet tonic (sorry, soda… Bostonian donchaknow).
A cop seeing me driving around drinking from a brown bottle might elicit some concern on his part, but not likely. Or if I were pulled over for another reason, I’d get the hairy eyeball, and perhaps the handy-dandy field sobriety test. Are there any circumstances whereby a police officer could cite me for drinking a non-alcoholic beverage? I suppose he could write me up for impaired driving, the same as if I had a cup of coffee or a donut in my hand, but that would most likely get laughed out of court, no?
I think you’ll need to scrutinize local laws. Obviously, one isn’t going to be under the influence from drinking this stuff. You wouldn’t fail a blood test. But if the law prohibits drinking any alcoholic beverage while driving, you could be in violation. I recall that laws in some areas, which prohibit sales of booze during certain times (e.g. Sunday), include products of this type because there is some alcohol in them, even if it’s a miniscule amount. I can’t see where an O’Douls would be considered an intoxicating beverage, but if the law says alcoholic beverage, you’re in trouble.
I believe some states have an “open bottle law”, which prohibits the presence of a can, bottle, or container that held an alcoholic beverage. It does not matter if the bottle has been rolling around in the back seat for a month. The situation in the OP could be in violation of such a law.
I was advised by one of my Captains that “less than 1/2 of 1 percent alcohol” is the legal definiton of non-alcoholic, and therefore having a “near-beer” open in a vehicle is no more illegal than having a Diet Pepsi, and therefore is not pc for a stop, nor is there anything to write on if one is found after a stop.
Only problem is I’ve never seen any case law on this, nor any memos from the D.A. or the Attorney General.
In most cases, if you pass the breath test, the cop will then simply issue you a ticket for speeding, weaving between lanes, failure to signal lane change, or just plain “careless driving” – basically, whatever it was that attracted his attention and caused him to pull you over in the first place. And it’s pretty likely to be upheld in court.
If a cop sees you drinking out of what appears to be a beer bottle, you can expect to be pulled over. If you don’t mind being pulled over and all the rest that goes with it, including the delay in getting to where you’re going, go for it! I, for one, would rather limit any possible interaction with the cops and save my O’Doul drinking for other places. It’s just not worth the aggravation to antagonize your local police, and as others have stated, they’ll probably ticket you for something anyway (open container, etc.) and you’ll have to go through the trouble of “telling it to the judge.” Do you really have that kind of time to waste?
I was given legalese b.s. by a New York State Trooper who happened to be in the parking lot at Jones Beach State Park.
Alcohol is prohibited there, so I asked him point-blank if I could open my O’Douls and drink it in the parking lot.
He wouldn’t give me a direct answer. All he would say was “if you’re drinking an alcoholic beverage on State Park grounds you will get a citation.”
In SD nonalcoholic beverages are defined by statute as “…those beverages which contain less than one-half of one percent of alcohol by volume…” SDCL 39-13-1
SDCL 39-1-9.1 covers open containers and states it is a misdemeanor for any occupant in a motor vehicle to consume or have an unsealed container of any alcoholic beverage.
SDCL 39-1-9.2 defines alcoholic beverages for 9.1 and states ““Malt beverage,” beer, ale, porter, stout, and other similar beverages of any name…suitable for human consumption containing not less than one-half of one percent of alcohol by volume;”
So, in SD you could have a near beer while driving. However, I would point out that you would still have a good chance of being pulled over if you were to been seen drinking from a bottle that looked like a regular beer. I was once pulled over just outside of Gillette, WY while drinking a bottle of sasperilla that was in a dark beer-like bottle. The Campbell County sheriff-deputy let me go as soon as he realized what it was but warned me that drinking from a dark brown bottle while driving was not a good idea. shrug