The obvious factor to say about Charleston Metropolis Councilman Harry Griffin’s driving below the affect cost that was dropped final week is that he wasn’t exonerated. Whether or not he was a fortunate DUI lottery winner or was unfairly stripped of the appropriate to show his innocence is one thing we’ll by no means know.
Happily, that’s not a very powerful factor about this case.
An important factor about this case is that it highlights another drawback with South Carolina’s inebriation-friendly DUI regulation.
Mr. Griffin was arrested on Might 29 when the Berkeley County Sheriff’s Workplace stopped him at a sobriety checkpoint and smelled alcohol on his breath. After initially telling deputies he hadn’t been ingesting, he mentioned he had “just one” drink. Then he refused to take a discipline sobriety take a look at or a Breathalyzer take a look at.
And as The Submit and Courier’s Gregory Yee reviews, the deputy who arrested him determined to get out of regulation enforcement earlier than the case got here to trial. Since Mr. Griffin’s refusal to take any form of sobriety take a look at meant the one proof in opposition to him was the deputy’s video and testimony, the cost was dropped.
Sadly, this form of factor is “a quite common drawback,” in accordance with Steven Burritt, government director of South Carolina Moms In opposition to Drunk Driving. Mr. Burritt advised us that the excessive turnover charge amongst cops in lots of S.C. businesses “creates a degree of jeopardy for the circumstances they made that haven’t been adjudicated.”
Police are capable of protect most felony circumstances, which depend on proof past an officer’s observations, however different circumstances are often dropped.
What does this should do with our driving below the affect regulation?
First, our DUI regulation incentivizes individuals to do what Mr. Griffin did and refuse to take a sobriety take a look at.
A state regulation that ought to discourage this says drivers who refuse to undergo a take a look at of their blood alcohol degree mechanically lose their license for six months, on the spot, even earlier than a trial.
Sadly, this sensible regulation has an insane provision that permits individuals to go right down to the DMV and get a short lived license to drive whereas their everlasting license is suspended. That is proper: It utterly undercuts the intent of the regulation. That is why greater than 40% of individuals stopped for drunken driving in South Carolina now refuse to take a take a look at. So the one proof in opposition to them is the arresting officer’s phrase.
(The S.C. Senate handed a invoice this yr that requires individuals with suspended licenses to have an ignition-interlock gadget put in on their automobiles earlier than they’ll get a short lived license. That wouldn’t take away the inducement to refuse the take a look at, however it might cease individuals from driving drunk till their case ultimately is heard. Sadly, the Home refused to think about the invoice.)
However even when individuals undergo a blood alcohol take a look at, the circumstances are nonetheless dropped when arresting officers strikes on until their businesses ship one other officer to courtroom to prosecute. They usually often don’t, as a result of the various loopholes in our DUI regulation make convictions unlikely. Loopholes like, for example, the one which makes it almost unattainable to win a conviction if the suspect wanders out of vary of the officer’s dashcam for even a number of seconds.
Exactly as a result of all these loopholes make DUI circumstances so sophisticated, there’s an excellent probability {that a} trial will probably be delayed. That will increase the prospect that the officer will probably be gone by the point the case is tried.
The easiest way to repair this drawback is for the Legislature to repair our DUI regulation: to alter the mother-may-I dashcam video necessities and remove the incentives to refuse blood alcohol assessments. It’s to offer funding so prosecutors somewhat than police attempt these extremely technical circumstances; to offer funding for our courts so the await a jury trial isn’t so lengthy; and to require higher coaching for magistrates, who often know a lot much less in regards to the regulation than the protection attorneys showing earlier than them.
All of that will make DUI circumstances appear extra winnable to police and would make driving below the affect seem to be a riskier option to drivers.
However even absent legislative motion, there are different steps that may assist cut back the departed-officer drawback — and a number of different issues with DUI circumstances.
Judges may be extra skeptical about protection requests for trial delays. Most of us may need been unaware of the issue with departing officers, however MADD and different organizations have documented that the percentages of successful a DUI conviction go down each day a trial is delayed. You possibly can make certain that DUI attorneys know that, too.
And police businesses can ship one other officer to prosecute DUI circumstances when the arresting officer has moved on, and the businesses can ask (or require, by way of subpoenas) departed officers to return and testify in some circumstances.
That is about much more than holding the occasional politician accountable, or just successful a conviction. It’s about saving lives.
One motive so many South Carolinians are injured and killed by drunken drivers is that our state doesn’t take drunken driving critically sufficient. That is largely the fault of the Legislature, however even with the legal guidelines we now have, everyone within the felony justice system has a chance to acknowledge and deal with drunken driving because the lethal crime that it’s.
