Defense Strategies for DUI Charges in Maryland
Being charged with drunk driving can absolutely ruin your day, let alone the coming months and even years of your life. DUI charges are expensive, and the fines and license suspensions can be a huge hassle, even if no one was hurt by your driving. Having a defense attorney on your side with a plan to fight your case is vital.
Our lawyers typically attack three major elements in a DUI case: the legality of the stop, the legality of the arrest, and the evidence the police and prosecutors supplied. If we can throw out any of this, we can often take away enough evidence from the defense that we can beat the charges against you.
For help with your criminal case, call the Baltimore DUI defense lawyers at Rice, Murtha & Psoras at (410) 694-7291 right away.
Fighting Traffic Stops for DUIs in Maryland
If the police stopped you illegally in the first place, then the resulting evidence they collected is illegal, and the resulting arrest based on that evidence is also illegal. Our 4th Amendment rights and a U.S. Supreme Court case called Terry v. Ohio (1968) require police to have “reasonable suspicion” to stop you, or else the results of the stop must be thrown out.
“Reasonable suspicion” is a low bar, but it is absolutely required – with one common exception – for a DUI traffic stop. Under this requirement, the police must have some articulable facts they can point to to say that they think an offense was happening and that you were responsible. This means they need to point to signs of drunk driving or another violation.
If the police witness you commit another traffic violation with their own eyes, then that usually gives them reasonable suspicion or even probable cause, making the stop (and even a ticket for that offense) legal. During that stop, they can then investigate you for drunk driving and, if they have enough evidence, arrest you. This means that if they witnessed you run a stop sign, run a red light, speed, fail to signal, or cause a car accident, they can stop you and investigate you for a potential DUI.
Other stops are based on evidence that suggests you were driving drunk, though it might not be enough to prove it in court. Swerving, driving slowly, changing speed a lot, failing to maintain your lane, tailgating, and other “bad driving” might indicate you are drunk and give police enough grounds to stop you. If they cannot point to evidence of this kind of bad driving, then they cannot stop you.
We mentioned that there was one exception to needing reasonable suspicion for a stop: DUI checkpoints. If a checkpoint is set up properly and administered properly, cars will be stopped without any particular suspicion attached to that driver/car. In this neutral way, they can stop you and investigate you for DUI, but use of checkpoints is limited and cannot stop every driver.
“Fruit of the Poisonous Tree” Doctrine in Illegal DUI Stops
As mentioned, the fact that the stop was illegal in the first place should be enough to shut down the case against you. Police cannot use evidence that was illegally obtained, and they cannot use the evidence that that evidence led to. For example, if the police stop you without reasonable suspicion and then find you with five empty beers in your passenger seat, they only got the beers because they pulled you over illegally. The beers would be suppressed as “fruit of the poisonous tree,” and similar rulings could block all evidence from an illegal traffic stop, even if they got really good evidence from that illegal stop.
Challenging Arrests for DUI in Maryland
Once you have been stopped legally, police need to get more evidence to arrest you. The standard for this – and for criminal charges to be brought – is “probable cause.” This is a higher standard but lower than “beyond a reasonable doubt.” If you had to put a percentage on how sure the police have to be for probable cause, most lawyers would say it is somewhere below 50%, but probably in the 40s.
The more evidence police have of drunk driving, the stronger their case for probable cause and a legal arrest will be. Some evidence is also pretty strong and would potentially be sufficient on its own. For example, if you admit you were driving drunk, then they can probably convict you on that, let alone arrest you legally. Additionally, something like multiple open containers would be strong evidence, alongside evidence you drank the alcohol (e.g., the odor of alcohol on your breath) and evidence of impaired driving (e.g., swerving).
There usually has to be “enough” evidence that you had alcohol in your system and that it caused you to drive poorly, meaning that slow speech, alcohol on your breath, swerving, slow movements, slow reactions, and similar attributes would often be enough for a DUI arrest.
Field sobriety tests and a portable breath test are often used at this stage to identify impairment. However, you can often say no to the pre-arrest tests – though you cannot legally refuse a breathalyzer test or blood test administered after the arrest. If you do “fail” the tests, they can use that as probable cause, but it is not necessarily strong evidence at trial.
Challenging Evidence of DUI in Maryland
If the stop and arrest were legal, we can still fight the evidence they have.
Breath tests and blood tests can be challenged if the instruments or tools used were not properly calibrated or if the test was tainted, e.g., by using an alcohol-based wipe before drawing blood. We can also challenge the admissibility of “scientific” evidence, such as the likely unscientific field sobriety tests used. For example, if the test was administered improperly – such as doing a walk and turn with an imaginary line instead of a real, visible line – then it is not scientifically valid and should not be used against you.
We can also challenge the officer’s statements and observations, especially if their dash cam or body cam disagrees with what they claimed. Other witnesses can also back up your story if they saw what happened.
Call Our DUI Defense Lawyers for Help in Maryland Today
If you were arrested for drunk driving, call our Ocean City, MD DUI defense lawyers at Rice, Murtha & Psoras at (410) 694-7291 today.