In “The Bad Girls’ Guide to the Open Road,” Cameron Tuttle suggests the following technique to getting out of a DUI. If you get pulled over, immediately step out of the car with a bottle of the liquor of your choice. Open it and chug a couple of shots worth. The officer now has no way of proving you had been drinking before you got out of the car. Sort of interesting to contemplate, but is this actually true? Being forced to hang out for awhile (or overnight) where you are until you sober up is much better than a DUI, but would this actually work? By the way, that book is quite entertaining! Anyway, whaddaya think? For some reason, the thread about driving into your garage and closing the door reminded me of this. Intriguing, but probably not true. This one has some potential, I think. The most the officer could do would be cite you for public intoxication/open container in public, perhaps?
How do you get home after? If you get back into your car, you can be charged with a DUI (IANAL, but having the keys and being in your car even if you’re not operating it while drunk can, I think, be used as a basis for a DUI in some jurisdictions).
If it goes to trial, the Judge and/or Jury may decide to believe that you were indeed driving drunk, and reject your assertion that you didnt drink until you were pulled over by the police.
In my state, you will be arrested for having an open bottle in a car. And, if I were on the jury, I would consider the fact that you stepped out of the car with an open bottle in your hand as rather convincing evidence that you had been drinking before you were stopped as well.
And I see no reason why you would fail a field sobriety test a few seconds after having your first few drinks of the evening. If you are drunk enough to get stopped for DUI, more drinking isn’t going to help no matter what the circumstances.
I don’t have time to look up cites for you right now, but there are a few problems with this trick:
- In many jurisdictions the offense is operating or being in control of a vehicle while under the influence. You might get away with it if you also throw your keys into the nearest field. Otherwise, it’s tricky.
- Some jurisdictions have defined the offense as operating a vehicle within two hours of having a BAC test result over .08. Some of these jurisdictions permit the driver to prove that post operation consumption of alcohol caused the offending result–others don’t.
- Retrograde Extrapoltion. http://www.ndaa.org/pdf/toxicology_final.pdf
and see http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=9989141#post9989141
From the Virginia Code:
So the long and short of it is that this won’t work - the second the cop sees the alcohol they have you. From there it’s a short hop to sobriety checks, and you’ll probably fail those. Good times.
Yeah, but if the alcohol is sealed before you open it?
The OP is saying the bottle is CLOSED.
Step 1) Get out of the car
Step 2) OPEN the bottle when you’re outside the car
Step 3) Drink it.
This is what the OP is proposing.
Like someone said, even if it did work you would be in trouble as some states can charge you even if you don’t drive, as long as you have possession of the keys and COULD operate it.
Drivers don’t get stopped for a DUI, they get stopped for doing [whatever]. The DUI would be a result of failing whatever test the officer administers.
The idea here is that you maintain you were not drinking before you got out of the car. A breathalyzer test is going to show positive, but that could be accounted for from your clearly ingesting some alcohol after you got out, and it would not establish that you had been drinking or were drunk before getting stopped.
Of course, besides the pitfalls others have mentioned, this technique would not negate a blood alcohol test or a coordination test.
Closed as in “factory sealed”? I don’t think that will help. Once you open it, with the keys in your possession, he has you.
If all else fails (it won’t),Officer Friendly can simply arrest you for intent to commit drunk driving. How were you going to make it home if he doesn’t arrest you? And what were you going to do with your car?
Ok, the bottle is closed.
The officer will administer field sobriety tests and then arrest you. Then you go down to the station and do a blood/breath/possibly urine test for blood alcohol content. You are over the limit so you go to jail.
The officer goes back and writes in his report, “At XXXX hours, I stopped the suspect for [insert traffic infraction]. The suspect immediately stepped out of the car, opened a bottle of Jack Daniels, and consumed half of it.”
In court, two things will happen:
(1) The officer will testify that you FAILED the field sobriety tests. This is pretty damning evidence that you were under the influence. If you opted not to perform the tests, then the officer will have gotten you down to the station quickly for the blood alcohol content test. Which leads to the second part…
(2) A criminalist will take the stand and testify that, based on your blood alcohol content, there is no way that you could have gotten there that fast by drinking half a bottle of Jack Daniels an hour before the test. Or they will show that your blood alcohol level is so high that you could not have gotten there from a half a bottle of Jack Daniels. Or they will show that drinking the half bottle will only elevate your blood alcohol level so much…and that when you take that amount away, you were still above the legal limit.
End result: (1) You get arrested, (2) you vomit in the drunk tank, (3) you hire a lawyer, (4) you are out 10 grand for nothing.
Let’s not forget how happy a prosecutor would be to get this case. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, when a reasonable person gets pulled over for failing to use their turn signal, they pull over and stop. They turn off the car. They roll down the window and keep their hands on the wheel. That’s what a reasonable person does. Here, the defendant, stepped out of the car. Not normal. With a bottle of liquor. Definitely not normal. The defendant stepped out of the car with a bottle of liquor. [pause/look incredulously at jury] Then, the defendant opened the bottle of liquor…in public…in front of a policeman…on the side of the road…and that’s not even the craziest part. The defendant tilted the bottle up and drank half of the bottle. Half of a bottle of liquor in front of a policeman. Why? Why would a reasonable person…just driving home from work…totally sober…do that?”
That’s my opinion anyways.
Excellent answers, all! It is interesting to think about, though. Thanks!
Having gotten pulled over by a cop, getting out of the car with something in my hand while the cop walks up to me is not what I think of as a good idea.
I saw an episode of some lawyer show where an attorney advised a relative to do what the OP suggests immediately after having an accident. So not for the purposes of avoiding a DUI per se, but to avoid being charged for causing an accident while under the influence. “I was so shocked by the accident that afterward I just had to open my trunk and get out my flask of Jack Daniels to calm my nerves.”
In many jurisdictions, stepping out of the car might get a gun pulled on you, forced to the ground and cuffed. Most cops want you where they can approach you from behind and don’t want you doing anything they didn’t instruct you to do.
Incidentally, I’ve heard the same advice as the OP but with a bottle of mouthwash* instead of booze. There is (UL alert) enough alcohol in a bottle of regular mouthwash to trip the Breathalyzer. Might not get you out of the ticket, but it might keep you out of the pokey.
*Follow this advice at your peril.
My reserve cop friend told me about pulling over a car that matched the description of one involved in a crime.
They lit up the car from the rear (to blind a shooter firing to the rear), but the girl driving would NOT sit still, bouncing all over and looking all over and backwards. “She almost got herself shot.” I suppose she’s lucky she didn’t make any sudden pointing movements or reach down and back up quickly.
Best way to avoid a DUI is not to drive while under the influence.
Yeah, but if they didn’t drive under the influence, they wouldn’t be “Bad Girls” now, would they…
Wouldn’t a flask not count as an originally closed container, though?
Yes, I realize that. That wasn’t the point of the OP.