Unless you have exceptionally good luck, you have probably been stopped for minor traffic infractions, such as driving with a burnt out tail light, and had to go to traffic court to resolve the situation. You can not deny that your tail light was broken, but you also complied with the officer’s request to fix it before your court date, so you appear in court, bring evidence of your compliance, such as a receipt from the repair shop or a picture of your now working traffic light. You plead no contest and present your evidence, and the judge dismisses the case. If only DWI cases were that simple.
DWI is More Serious Than Your Average Traffic Stop
DWI cases usually start with a simple traffic stop, but, unlike driving with a broken tail light, DWI is a criminal offense, in some cases even a felony. What if you actually were driving drunk? If you go to court and say, “Yes, I was driving drunk,” you would be pleading guilty to criminal charges, which would end up on your criminal record. (Under certain circumstances, you might be eligible to go to rehab instead, through a pretrial diversion program.) What you should do instead, if you are stopped for DWI, is contact a defense lawyer, but what can a defense lawyer do to help you if you were, in fact, driving under the influence at the time of the traffic stop?
Was it Unfair for the Officer to Stop You?
One of the most common and most successful defenses that DWI defense lawyers make in court is that the officer had no business stopping you in the first place. Unless you were driving in an obviously unsafe way, such a driving much faster or much slower than the speed limit, you can argue that there was no legal justification for the officer to stop you. If the court accepts this argument, you may be able to get the case dismissed, or at least stop the prosecution from using certain pieces of evidence obtained during the unjust traffic stop.
Many of the reasons that police officers stop motorists are subjective and not clear-cut. In fact, law enforcement officers have attracted plenty of criticism for stopping motorists for apparently trivial offenses in an attempt to catch them in the act of more serious crimes like drug possession or driving with a suspended license. Once it gets to the point of field sobriety tests, things get even more subjective. It is often your word against the officer’s as to whether your balance and motor skills were like that of a drunk person or a sober person. Besides this, field sobriety tests are quite unscientific, and a person would have to be very healthy and physically fit to pass some of them.
Contact Mario Madrid About DWI Cases
If you were the target of an unfair DWI traffic stop, you need an experienced defense lawyer. Contact Madrid Law in Houston for a consultation.
