Under Minnesota law (Minn. Stat. Chap. 169A), if you are stopped for suspicion of driving under the influence or otherwise impaired by drugs or alcohol and blow higher than .08 in a breathalyzer then you will be charged with DWI. Read More...

Three years ago, Minnesota’s endeavor into medical marijuana legalization became one of the country’s most restrictive programs. Consequently, patients who were unable to afford state-approved marijuana turned to the estimated $700 million marijuana black market. Read More...

Currently, Minnesota has 16 DWI or hybrid DWI/drug courts with the two largest in Ramsey and Hennepin counties. Other courts are located primarily in rural counties; however, proponents—including DWI court judges—hope ongoing legislative funding will enable these specialty courts to expand across the state. According to Sixth Judicial District Chief Judge Shaun Floerike—who runs Duluth’s DWI court—having no DWI court options typically means an automatic trip to prison.

How DWI courts work

Briefly, DWI courts work to change the behavior of repeat DWI/DUI offenders with the threat of incarceration if they fail the diversion program. Treatment and frequent alcohol and drug testing are combined with constant contact with probation officers, behavioral therapists, driver’s license reinstatement programs. Participants are closely monitored by a judge who is part of a team comprised of prosecutors, defense attorneys, probation officers, therapists, and other criminal justice system actors. Graduation typically occurs after at least one year in the program.

DWI court populations differ from other drug courts. For example, whereas DWI courts have a higher percentage of white males who are employed with a higher education, drug court participants more commonly are unemployed and have been diagnosed with a mental health issue.

DWI courts save money, reduce recidivism

According to a 2014 report by the state’s Office of Traffic Safety Read More...

First, it is important to understand the difference between a preliminary roadside breath test and the test at the police station. The roadside test is simply to determine if a stopped motorist may be driving drunk or otherwise chemically impaired. Confirmatory tests are conducted at the police station—often with more sophisticated machinery—and these results determine whether a subject will face prosecution.

Adherence to the observation period

Before a motorist takes a breath test, the police officer is supposed to observe the subject for 15-20 minutes to ensure that abdominal alcohol is not introduced into the mouth or that the subject doesn’t introduce anything into his/her mouth. Because of the higher concentration of abdominal alcohol, belching, burping, or vomiting could increase one’s mouth alcohol and give a skewed result. This observation period ensures that mouth alcohol dissipates and no new sources are introduced.

In many cases, this observation period doesn’t involve actual observation. However, the burden of proof that the motorist was not adequately observed falls on the defendant’s shoulders to prove that the officer failed to ensure the validity of the breath test.

For example, in one case a police officer wrote in his report that while observing the subject, the subject burped but did not belch, yet he failed to differentiate the two. The officer also failed to conduct another observation period to ensure mouth alcohol dissipation. At the implied consent hearing, the judge dismissed the case because of inadequate scientific safeguards.

Proper use of breathalyzer equipment

A police stop is based on an officer’s observation of a motorist’s driving and his/her behavior following the stop. These observations are not scientific, so the use of breath testing machines helps support (or, in some cases, refute) the officer’s claims that a subject was driving drunk.

In Minnesota, the DataMaster DMT is the go-to device for DWI evidentiary breath testing after many legal challenges surfaced about the previous device, the Intoxilyzer 5000EN. Even though the DataMaster DMT is considered far more reliable, the machine is far from infallible, and the way in which it is used and maintained significantly impact its accuracy.

A police officer must be trained and properly certified to administer breath tests. A good defense attorney will always investigate the officer’s credentials to ensure they are valid and current. The attorney will also ensure that the test was conducted in accordance with departmental policy and per the machine’s operation manual. If testing procedures are not followed, then the test can be argued as inaccurate, unreliable, and invalid.

Similarly, a breath machine must be properly maintained and calibrated, and a good DWI/DUI attorney will request the department’s records to ensure such is the case.

Beware of stomach alcohol Read More...

In the last five years, nearly 16 percent of all fatal automobile accidents in Minnesota over Labor Day weekend were DWI/DUI-related, making it the sixth deadliest holiday in the state. Compounding the problem is that as of 9 August this year, the state surpassed 200 road fatalities.

In 2016, 392 people were killed in automobile crashes on Minnesota roads, and nearly 266,000 Minnesota drivers have at least one DWI on their record. Granted, these fatalities were not all drunk driving-related; however, DWI/DUI is the leading cause of traffic accidents in Minnesota, followed by speeding and distracted driving.

DPS’ enforcement crackdown seeks to prevent any more needless accidents and deaths.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), drunk driving results in nearly 10,000 deaths, 1.1 million arrests, and $44 billion in economic damage annually across the US.

Spotlight on State Trooper Andrew Martinek Read More...

Here are 12 of the most common strategies successfully used by DWI/DUI attorneys.

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Since Birchfield, courts and prosecutors and police and legislators across the country have been scrambling trying to implement new rules and reinterpret old ones. States have been under pressure to comply with the recent Supreme Court ruling, but sometimes feel as if they’re flying blind, with many specific questions remaining to be answered. As part of this effort to comply with the new law of the land, some states are being forced to introduce new laws, changing prior practice and angering certain groups along the way.

An example of this just occurred in Tennessee, where the legislature rolled out a comprehensive change to the state’s drunk driving laws. The changes managed to simultaneously anger the national anti-drunk driving group Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) and a state association of criminal defense attorneys. The former believes the law is too lax, the latter believes it’s improperly stringent.

So what does the new law say? The law, which took effect on July 1st, eliminates some charges for those who refuse to submit to certain drugs and alcohol impairment tests. Lawmakers have passed a rule that says drunk drivers who refuse to submit to a blood alcohol test can still have their driver’s license suspended, but cannot face additional fines or jail time as a result of refusing.

Lawmakers say they passed the law to comply with the Birchfield decision, which ruled that implied-consent laws were unconstitutional in some cases. The goal is to change the law to comply with the ruling and to do that legislators needed to create a new law that does not criminalize a suspected drunk driver’s refusal to submit to a blood test.

The problem, according to MADD, is that Tennessee is prioritizing the rights of drunk drivers over the rights of the larger community to be free from dangers on the road. MADD has attacked the legislation as an example of lawmakers being soft on crime. The Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers say that they don’t like the new law either as it stiffen penalties for some drunk driving offenses. They also feel the law should go farther in making clear that warrantless blood tests are unconstitutionally improper in the vast majority of cases.

The lawmakers who have found themselves under fire say they’re only doing what they feel is required to bring Tennessee into alignment with the Supreme Court ruling. Additionally, legislators say if they had failed to take action Tennessee would’ve lost federal revenue as a punishment, jeopardizing other public safety programs.

Source: “MADD is…mad about changes to Tennessee DUI law,” by Mike Osborne, published at WMOT.org.

First, let’s start by saying that the current case before the North Dakota Supreme Court arrived a year after the U.S. Supreme Court issued another important decision concerning drunk driving. The case, Birchfield v. North Dakota, dealt with a question about the constitutionality of warrantless breath and blood tests in drunk driving cases. The Supreme Court heard a challenge to the practice and ended up ruling in favor of allowing breathalyzer tests without a warrant. However, the Court said that warrantless blood tests are invasive and unconstitutional, deciding that that this amounted to an impermissible search and seizure.

That case was important not only for the defendants, but for suspected drunk drivers across the country. Police departments all over had to change their policies as it relates to drunk driving and could no longer rely on rules allowing warrantless blood tests. Though the Court was definitive when it came to blood and breath tests, it left open the question of urine tests. States, like North Dakota, are now having to decide for themselves how to handle such cases and are debating whether urine tests are more similar to breath or blood analysis.

The current case before the North Dakota Supreme Court began in May of 2016 when a police officer in Fargo stopped a driver for operating a vehicle without headlights. The officer conducted several field sobriety tests and arrested the driver, suspecting him of being under the influence of drugs. The officer requested the driver submit to a urine test, something the driver refused. As a result, the driver was charged with a Class C felony.

The driver’s attorney has since challenged the refusal charge, arguing that the law doesn’t allow for warrantless seizure of urine and thus should not justify any criminal charge for refusing to submit to such a test. A lower level court agreed with the driver, saying that urine tests are far closer to blood tests than breath tests. The lower court decided that urine tests are likely to lead to much more embarrassment for the suspect than a breath test. The court also held that the Fourth Amendment gives a person the right to be secure in his or her bodily fluids and that this protection should extend to include urine as much as it does blood.

The state has appealed the decision to the North Dakota Supreme Court. Prosecutors argue that urine testing is now the only real option for testing for the presence of drugs in suspected impaired drivers now that blood testing has been thrown out. They also argue that the state has a strong interest in deterring drug-impaired driving and that this kind of testing is integral to furthering that interest. Whether the State Supreme Court will be persuaded remains to be seen. However, if Minnesota is any judge, the answer may be no. Just last year the Minnesota Supreme Court held that a drunk driver shouldn’t be prosecuted for refusing to submit to a warrantless urine test.

Source: North Dakota Supreme Court debates urine testing in DUI cases, by John Hageman, published at BismarckTribune.com.

As technology advances, laws have simply not kept up. In many states—including Minnesota—law enforcement’s hands are tied when it comes to issuing citations for talking on a cellphone in traffic. This behavior is as dangerous as driving with a .08 blood alcohol concentration (BAC), leading to unnecessary vehicular accidents, injuries, and deaths.

The bill was to be included in the House’s current transportation bill but now faces delay until next year. If Dayton vetoes the current transportation bill, a new cellphone ban initiative could be placed into a revised bill in the near future.

Current and Proposed Minnesota Law Read More...

Normally, obtaining a search warrant is a long and tedious process. In the past, obtaining a search warrant required filling out an application along with an affidavit of probable cause specifying exactly what is to be searched and seized and also required a face-to-face meeting between a law enforcement officer and a judge.

However, now Minnesota law enforcement officers have a new tool to make getting a warrant for a DWI suspect easier. The eSearch Warrant is an express lane of sorts giving police officers almost instant results when dealing with DWI suspects.

Case Law

Back in 2015, in State v. Bernard, the Minnesota Supreme Court held that an officer can, in fact, test a drunk driving suspect’s breath immediately, but a blood or urine test required a search warrant because of the greater intrusiveness of such tests and the fact that blood and urine contain significantly more personal and sensitive information. Since the only information law enforcement and prosecutors need in a DWI case is the defendant’s blood alcohol concentration (BAC), breath tests which provide just that information remain the only test for which police need not obtain a warrant.

Then, in 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Birchfield v. North Dakota that criminalizing refusal to submit to a blood or urine test was unconstitutional and in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unlawful searches and seizures.

eSearch Warrants

The transition to eSearch Warrants began in October 2016 and, according to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), the transition is now completed statewide.

Now, officers apply for search warrants electronically. The judge on call in the county at the time receives an electronic notification to log into the system where s/he can review the application and affidavit. The judge then responds in writing and calls the officer to finalize the warrant.

The BCA asserts that the transition to electronic search warrants became a priority after several court rulings held that drunk driving suspects may only be subjected to a blood or urine test if police obtain a search warrant. The warrant requirement does not apply to breath tests because breath tests are not as invasive as blood or urine tests.

Serving a Warrant

According to Minnesota law, search warrants must be served only between 7 a.m. and 8 p.m.; however, courts have the power to authorize nighttime searches if a judge agrees that by waiting until morning, valuable evidence may be lost or destroyed or in cases where the search may be done more safely at night. With respect to DWI suspects, waiting until morning would undoubtedly result in the suspect’s blood alcohol content (BAC) decreasing, thus negating the officer’s legitimate case against him/her.

Benefits of the New System Read More...