Articles Posted in Driver’s License Reinstatement

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As any lawyer familiar with Illinois DUI laws is aware, since January 1, 2009, Illinois has allowed drivers suspended for DUI to obtain a driving permit upon installation of a BAIID machine. Some commentators have questioned whether the MDDP program is effective.

The BAIID machine is part of the MDDP program. Evidence exists that the BAIID machine provides false alcohol readings caused by pizza, mouthwash, cough medicine and other substances other than alcohol. Therefore, we arguably have a program that is not only ineffective but also unfair.

The MPPD program comes into play when your license is suspended before you conclude your DUI case. On the other hand, if you are convicted of the DUI, your license will be revoked and you must have an Illinois Driver’s license reinstatement hearing with the Illinois Secretary of State.

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State representative Ron E. Stephens has pleaded guilty to DUI in Macon County (Decatur) Illinois circuit court. This was his first DUI offense.

As any experienced Illinois DUI lawyer can tell you, this makes Stephens eligible for court supervision. Under a supervision disposition, you do not suffer a revocation of your Illinois driver’s license and thereby avoid an Illinois driver’s license reinstatement hearing.

In addition to protecting his driver’s license, Stephens was able to avoid jail time that could have resulted from a DUI conviction. Stephens was ordered to pay fines and court costs of $1,410.00. Furthermore, during the one year he is subject to the supervision of the Macon County courts, Stephens is to refrain from the consumption of any amount of alcohol.

As a Springfield, Illinois DUI and driver’s license reinstatement lawyer, I am familiar with nearby Macon County practices. The sentenced he received, as well as the fines and conditions of his supervision, are the same that any other Macon County DUI offender could expect.

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As reported, an alleged drunk driver was involved in a fatal crash and charged with DUI and reckless homicide. A reckless homicide conviction could result in prison time, and a conviction for DUI or reckless homicide will cause a driver’s license revocation, the length of which will depend upon the driver’s previous driving record and whether the conviction is for DUI or reckless homicide.

A knowledgeable, highly experienced Illinois driver’s license reinstatement lawyer will explain to you that the Illinois Secretary of State, Department of Administrative Hearings considers fatal accidents to be the most serious type of case his office hears. In the typical Illinois Driver’s License Reinstatement Hearing, the Secretary of State has only limited information about your Illinois DUI arrest. In a fatal accident case, he will have all the police investigate reports, accident reconstruction reports, photographs, a transcript of the county coroner’s inquest and jury verdict, the crash report, the autopsy, and the grand jury indictment or the criminal information or complaint filed against you.

For hearings involving fatality, the Secretary of State allows extra time on his calendar to hear the case. This is done because you will be questioned in detail about all the information in the materials that the Secretary of State has gathered from the State’s Attorney and the police. In addition, the Secretary of State will notify the family members of the deceased that you have requested a Driver’s License Hearing and will advise them of their right to appear and testify at the hearing.

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You may be facing your first DUI charge. It could have been one of those fluke situations–you had a couple of drinks too many this one time and ended up driving. That can happen in real life.

However, because of pervasive distorted reporting by powerful interest groups and their media mouthpieces, the DUI system operates under different assumptions. These assumptions explain why the DUI arrest and driver’s license reinstatement hearing processes may not function as you would expect.

First, some background will be helpful. There are two related but different tracks in an Illinois DUI situation. DUI is a crime that can result in jail and or fines. You are presumed to be innocent of the crime of DUI until proven guilty.

A DUI arrest can also result in license sanctions (suspension), and more severe sanctions (revocation) result from a conviction. The law does not consider the license sanctions to be in the nature of criminal proceedings and therefore the protections afforded in the criminal case (such as innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt) do not apply. If your license is revoked for DUI, you must prove to the Illinois Secretary of State that you will be a safe driver in the future.

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If you are convicted of DUI and have an Illinois driver’s license, your license will be revoked. You must then submit yourself to a driver’s license reinstatement process before you are allowed to drive legally. The length of time you are required to wait before being eligible for reinstatement depends upon your age, the type of offense you committed and your previous driving record.

Something to keep in mind during this discussion: You may have been convicted of DUI in another state while driving on your Illinois driver’s license. If that conviction appears on your Illinois driving record, it will be treated as though it occurred in Illinois.

Illinois drivers may (but not necessarily will) receive court supervision for their first DUI offense. Court supervision is not a conviction and it does not result in a driver’s license revocation. In supervision cases, your license might be suspended, but it will not be revoked. This means that once the suspension period is over, you pay a fee and are automatically reinstated without a hearing.

A first conviction, on the other hand, results in a one-year revocation of your driver’s license. However, the Secretary of State will not automatically return your license to you (as happens in the case of a suspension). The end of the revocation period only signifies that upon attending a hearing, you are entitled to ask for your license.

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If this is your first Illinois DUI arrest, things may not be as bad as they could be. The sentence that celebrity playwright and actor Sam Shepard received for his Bloomington, Illinois DUI arrest is fairly typical for first offenders.

The term “first offender” has two very different meanings for someone arrested for an Illinois DUI. That is because an Illinois DUI takes two related but different tracks.

At the time of the DUI arrest, the police will almost certainly ask you to take a breath test. Unless you take the test and register less than .08, your license will be suspended. The length of the suspension will depend upon whether you took or refused the test and whether or not you are a first offender.

Before I go any further, you should understand the difference between an Illinois driver’s license suspension and an Illinois driver’s license revocation.

A suspension is for a limited amount of time. When the suspension ends, your license is automatically returned to you upon payment of the appropriate fee.

A revocation is for a specified period of time during which you cannot drive, just like a suspension. However, unlike a suspension, a revocation ends only after you have an Illinois driver’s license reinstatement hearing with the Illinois Secretary of State. In other words, it is not automatic.

Remember that a driver’s license suspension occurs if you refuse the breath test or take and fail it. A driver’s license revocation occurs if you are convicted of DUI.

For purpose of the suspension, you are a first offender if you have not had a DUI arrest in the previous 5 years. If you have had a DUI arrest in the previous 5 years, you are a non-first offender.

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Illinois has a “four strikes” lifetime driver’s license revocation if you meet certain criteria. The factors that must be present for the lifetime revocation to apply are:

1) Your Illinois driver’s license is revoked because of a DUI.

2) You have four (4) or more DUI convictions. This includes convictions that occurred in Illinois, as well as any that occurred in another state. However, court supervision is not a conviction and will not count towards the four.

3) At least one of the DUI offenses occurred after January 1, 1999.

If the above conditions exist, Illinois will not be able to provide you with a hearing to ask for any type of driving relief, either reinstatement or a Restricted Driving Permit (RDP). What this means is that you will never be allowed to drive in Illinois for any reason.

Furthermore, if you attempt to obtain a license in any other state, or if you have a license in another state that they will not renew due to an Illinois hold, Illinois will not release the hold. As a result, your home state might not issue you a license.

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The Illinois Zero Tolerance (ZT) Law provides that if you are under the age of 21 years and are stopped for a traffic violation and the police suspect you may have been drinking, they are entitled to ask you to take a breath, blood or urine test to determine if there is any amount of alcohol or drugs in your system. Even though the legal limit for driving in Illinois for a driver over 21 is .08, for a driver under 21, any amount of alcohol (or drugs, including marijuana) above zero is illegal.

Upon finding alcohol or drugs in your system, the police will issue you a Zero Tolerance ticket and report it to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State will suspend your license for three (3) months for a first offense. If you refuse to submit to testing, you will be suspended for six (6) months for a first offense.

However, you can and will also lose your license in other circumstances if  you receive a ticket for illegal consumption or possession of alcohol, provided that you are an occupant of a motor vehicle.  I will refer to these as drinking tickets.

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You are probably reading this because the state in which you now reside either will not renew an existing license or will not issue an original one because the national registry has “flagged” an Illinois DUI. Your state’s DMV has informed you that before it can issue you a license, you must remove the Illinois hold. In order to accomplish this, you must have a hearing (either through a mailed-in packet or in-person) with the Secretary of State (which is Illinois’ DMV).

Each state is now required, before issuing a new driver’s license, or renewing an existing one, to check the national registry of driving records to determine if the driver has received DUI arrests in any other states. This new requirement, driven by Federal law, can affect both Illinois and out-of-state residents.

The system is known as Problem Driver Pointer System (PDPS), as it is designed to “point” other states to problem drivers. Because of PDPS, the days of jumping from state to state in order to avoid DUI revocations is over, and many drivers are finding their pasts catching up to them.

While on rare occasions the national registry misses DUI offenses, for the most part, it picks them up, even very old ones. This occurs even in those instances where a judge or lawyer many years ago assured you that the case would be dismissed, expunged, not go on your record, disappear or not otherwise “count”.

Even if the DUI itself was dropped, or was never charged, the arrest will show up if you were offered the breath test but refused to take it, or took the breath test and registered above the legal limit for that state.

Some states purge (remove) DUI arrests from their own records. (Illinois does not). However, despite being removed from the official driving record, the DUI is nonetheless likely to appear on the national registry.

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Not every person who has a Driving Under the Influence conviction (DUI) is required to have the Breath Alcohol Interlock Ignition Device (BAIID) (“breath machine” or “blow machine”).

The Breath Alcohol Interlock Ignition Device (BAIID) comes into play in many but not all Restricted Driving Permit (RDP) and reinstatement cases. The purpose of the machine is to detect alcohol on your breath.

If you are issued an RDP and are required to have a BAIID, you must hire a licensed installer to place the BAIID in any vehicle you intend to operate while the permit is in effect. The vehicle will not start unless you blow into a tube that is connected to the motor vehicle’s ignition system.

In addition, while the car is moving, at random intervals you will be required to blow into the tube. The results are stored electronically in a computer chip that is part of the BAIID machine.

On a monthly basis, the results of the readings are electronically transmitted to the Secretary of State. If there are alcohol readings, the Secretary of State will mail you a letter requesting an explanation.

If the explanation is acceptable, that is the end of the inquiry. If the Secretary of State rejects the explanation and you are classified as alcohol dependent, the Secretary of State will cancel the permit or license. In that case, he will not give you a hearing to request a new license or permit for a year unless you successfully contest the cancellation by persuading a hearing officer that the alcohol readings and resulting cancellation were in error.

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We have provided effective advice and assistance to thousands of clients facing driver's license suspensions and revocations, both in Illinois and out-of-state, including students from area colleges and universities.

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