Illinois DUI Lawyer Blawg

A much-anticipated Illinois Supreme Court opinion held that the HGN, one of three standardized field sobriety tests in Illinois DUI cases, was a valid indicator of alcohol impaired driving. What this means in practical terms that the state will not have to provide expert testimony that the HGN is some evidence of alcohol impairment every time it wishes to use the HGN in an Illinois DUI prosecution.

While this decision is helpful to the state, the Supreme Court placed limits on its use. First of all, the state cannot present the test as proof of intoxication. It will be treated like the other standardized field sobriety tests, or like an open beer can in your car, or an odor of alcohol on your breath, or your admission that you had been drinking. None of these things, standing alone, proves that you are drunk. They just tend to make it more likely that you had consumed alcohol.

The Court also held that any police officer who administers the HGN must be trained according to the student manual of the National Traffic Safety Highway Administration (NHTSA).

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The San Diego Union Tribune newspaper recently reported on a California DUI arrest with a Cook County, Illinois connection. A man in San Diego, California faces prison time of 15 years to life for a DUI arrest that led to the death of another person.

The article notes that California law, like that of many other states, including Illinois, provides for enhanced penalties when you have had previous DUI or reckless homicide convictions. It turns out that this driver had a reckless homicide conviction in Cook County, Illinois in 1952 and an Alaska DUI conviction in 1988. The California authorities are aware of these convictions, despite their age and distance from California.

There was a time that a driver could run from state to state in order to avoid the consequences of DUI convictions. A couple of things have since converged to make that more difficult. For one thing, technology had made it much easier and cost effective for agencies in the 50 states to communicate with one another.

However, while the technology constitutes a staring point, the National Driver Registry (NDR), also known as the Problem Driver Pointer System (PDPS), makes it possible for the 50 states to share information among themselves. The NDR is defined as “a central repository of information on individuals whose privilege to drive has been revoked, suspended, canceled or denied or who have been convicted of serious traffic-related offenses”.

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An emergency room nurse in Chicago recently refused to draw blood from a patient at the request of police. The police suspected alcohol caused the accident for which the accused sought medical care.

The nurse insisted on first consulting her supervisor, and the article focused on the her lawsuit against the City for arresting her, an arrest she believed was unjustified. But the article also provides an opportunity for a discussion of DUI, hospitals, blood draws and the police.

According to government statistics, the chances of a DUI accident are pretty high. In 2007, over 250,000 crashes with injuries involved alcohol and another 13,000 were killed in such crashes. Those involved in such crashes often end up in the emergency room due to their injuries.

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Recently in the news is that former Chicago Blackhawks star Chris Chelios was arrested in Illinois for DUI. As I viewed this online report from the Daily Herald, the following statement from reporter Jim Davis, who had viewed the DUI arrest video caught my eye:

I had heard that the field-sobriety tests are tough to ace, even to someone who might be stone-cold sober. So as Chelios struggled a bit with keeping his arms at his side, balancing on one foot and counting “one one-thousand, two one-thousand …” I was compelled to stand up and try this myself. I didn’t fall, but I wobbled and had to stretch out my arms for balance. And, for the record, I was stone-cold sober at the time.

Most of us have heard of the police asking you to “walk a straight line”. The United States Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has a name for this: Standardized Field Sobriety Test (SFST).

NHTSA defines the SFST as “a battery of three tests administered and evaluated in a standardized manner to obtain validated indicators of impairment and establish probable cause for arrest”. In other words, the officer will ask you to perform three tests, and your performance on those tests will be one of the factors he will use in deciding whether to arrest you for DUI.

The officer will usually capture your performance on the SFST with a video camera situated in his squad car. The three tests are the:

· Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus (HGN)
· Walk-and-Turn (WAT)
· One-Leg Stand (OLS)

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