DWI & Videotape Evidence

In Texas DWI cases, there’s almost always a video tape of your client. It will include some driving, and many times the entire substantive interaction between the arresting officer and the defendant.

And that’s going to end up being a better record of how someone did on the Field Sobriety Tests than the officer’s recollection.

True, the initial portion of the traffic stop, i.e., the reason for the initial detention may not be recorded. For example, the Austin DWI Task Force officers drive cars equipped with video cameras, but they only activate once the overheads have been turned on.

Since the officer isn’t going to activate his overheads to pull someone over until after he sees a traffic violation, unfortunately this isn’t caught on tape.

But wait, you say… no video, means no evidence right? And if they can’t prove the traffic violation, then the judge will have to grant a Motion to Suppress and throw the case out.

Not so fast.

There’s no rule requiring the State to present videotape evidence in a DWI, or in any other type of criminal case for that matter. In fact, in most jury trials, for non-DWI offense, there is no video tape evidence of any kind.

Evidence usually comes from the witness stand in the form of oral testimony from one or more witnesses, and that may be it.

How many times do you think the State has to produce a videotape of somebody actually committing a murder to convict them of it? I’m sure it’s happened, but it isn’t all that common.

I’m a big fan of videotape. At least the officer will be confined to the facts of the case, rather than feel free to add incriminating statements or other evidence that can’t be disproved.

I’m also glad to see that Texas DPS has recently gotten a new video machine in some of their vehicles. Apparently, it works like a DVR. It is constantly recording, and it keeps several minutes in the pipeline, so to speak. Then, when overheads are activated, the machine actually saves several minutes worth of video prior to the lights coming on.

Yes, this often leads to videotape evidence of my client committing that traffic violation that the DWI officer is claiming. But the judge was likely to take his word for it anyway, if there hadn’t been video.

Consequently, not having the video of the driving is almost always a losing issue for the defense. But recently, I litigated a Motion to Suppress where the officer had written in his report that my client had ‘Failed to Maintain a Single Marked Lane’.

And the video showed the Trooper’s approach of the vehicle, and my client’s tires barely crossing the line once. But we could also show, due to the DVR-style video, that there was no other traffic around, and that the movement wasn’t unsafe to others.

Based on that, I made the argument that the State had failed to prove reasonable suspicion to detain because the video evidence didn’t meet the standards of the Hernandez case. [Short version: Defendant doesn’t commit Failure to Maintain a Single Marked Lane in a case where he crossed the line once, by 18 inches, and did not cause any safety hazard to others. The case itself has been watered down significantly since it was issued in 1998, but the facts on my video were actually remarkably close to the original case.]

The judge took the case under advisement, and I don’t have a ruling yet. But without that extra bit of videotape evidence, I wouldn’t have been able to even make a credible argument.

I doubt the officer would have admitted that it was only one time, that no other cars were around, that the movement wasn’t unsafe, etc.

The ‘extra’ videotape in that case may end up saving my client from a DWI conviction

Visual Detection of DWI Motorists - According to NHTSA

The NHTSA DWI Detection and Standardized Field Sobriety Testing Manual has a chapter devoted to “DWI Detection Phase One: Vehicle in Motion”. A list of 24 driving cues which “police officers may use to detect nighttime impaired drivers” is the meat of the chapter.

These same 24 cues are also listed in NHTSA’s booklet “The Visual Detection of DWI Motorists”. The chapter in the manual breaks these driving behaviors, most of which but not all are traffic violations, into four separate categories:

1. Problems Maintaining Proper Lane Position
2. Speed and Braking Problems
3. Vigilance Problems
4. Judgment Problems

The second part of Phase One: Vehicle in Motion is entitled “The Stopping Sequence”. In it, the officer is told to look for how the vehicle responds to the signal to stop (which will almost always be the activation of police overheads). Cues include:

1. an attempt to flee
2. no response
3. slow response
4. an abrupt swerve
5. sudden stop, and
6. striking the curb or another object

In most cases, while my client will probably be spotted initially committing a traffic violation, which may be included in the first 24 driving behaviors, the vast majority of times they exhibit none of the stopping sequence cues.

Absence of these cues, of course, does not prove the absence of intoxication. But, the defense is not required to prove innocence. Secondly, pointing out that all of these behaviors commonly associated with the typical intoxicated driver do not apply to my client can be useful for cross examination of the stopping officer.

[For those interested, The Visual Detection of DWI Motorists is available free of charge in booklet form upon request to: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration – Impaired Driver Division, 400 Seventh Street, SW., Room 5118, Washington D.C., 20590.]

Missed It By That Much

I should know better than to get my hopes up.

Yesterday morning, my client’s DWI was set for a pretrial conference. That’s the last setting before a contested pretrial motions hearing in Travis County. But it doesn’t get set for pretrial motions until the complaint and information (official charging instrument in a misdemeanor) have been filed at the county clerk’s office.

This was – hang on, let me go check my calendar – the 27th time my client’s case was set on the docket. Which is a lot – but, no complaint and information, it just keeps getting reset about once every 3 or 4 weeks for another status check.

Today was 732 days after my client’s arrest. Two years and two days after. The statute of limitations for a misdemeanor DWI in Texas – which applies to the filing of the charging instrument only – expired two days ago. But this morning when I looked in the clerk’s file, the C&I was there. It had been filed in between the last two settings, just under the two year deadline.

Sigh.

That’s OK. Now I’ll just have to earn my fee the regular way.

Maybe It Should Be The Law, But It Isn't

Over two years ago, I wrote a post called “The Implied Consent Fallacy”. In the essay I objected to the legal fiction that everyone knows they are consenting to give a breath or blood test when asked by the police, simply by virtue of applying for and accepting a Texas Driver’s License.

Semi-anonomous first time reader “Jason” weighed in recently with this comment:

It's a good law. Bottom line, don't drive after consuming alcohol.

Simple enough, why don't they get it? Too bad there are attorney's [sic] who defend these people of lower than average intelligence.

Well, Jason, despite the fact that you missed the entire point of the post itself, let’s address your point. It seems to be that you think:

Driving after consuming alcohol is illegal…

and that therefore,

You deserve to have your license suspended…

even if the suspension is predicated on the falsehood that you knowingly and willingly agreed to provide a breath specimen when you got your driver’s license.

Just one problem with your theory… taint so. It is not illegal to consume an alcoholic beverage and get behind the wheel in Texas. You can make a good argument that it should be; but until you change the law to make it so, your premise is 100% incorrect.

One last thing. I often edit people’s grammar and spelling errors in comments, but given this particular combination of double ad hominem attack with a healthy dose of self righteousness I decided to let your comment stand as is.

Questions: One Always Seems to Lead to Another

My internet stats program for this blog - Mint - keeps track of IP addresses associated with various searches as well as other interesting (if you’re a geek) tidbits of information. Tonight I saw the following string of searches, which started five weeks ago:

How long does a DWI case take in Travis County?

Of course the answer to this question, like all of those that don’t provide enough information to properly answer, is… it depends. But let me see if I can do better than that anyway. The discovery process – getting the video, offense report, intoxilyzer records if it’s a breath test case, and sitting down at least once to substantively chat with a prosecutor about your case? – will take at least three to four months, sometimes longer.

Several more uncontested settings and at least one contested pretrial setting on a motion to suppress can be several more months, depending primarily on availability of the officer and your lawyer’s schedule.

How long will you be on the jury docket if you don’t work out a plea? I talked to a client earlier today and his case is a year and half old. We are just now bubbling to the top of the jury docket in that court. (I’d say that’s a little unusual, but it’s by no means record-setting either.)

Next search, some time later, same IP:

Travis County DWI No Contest

Can’t tell if this is part of a “do I have to hire a lawyer” stage. Since the first search is only five weeks ago, it seems a tad early to be hearing this from your lawyer, but who knows? Maybe it’s just ‘background’ research on what happens. Next query:

Transcripts of ALR hearings

Seems like something a lawyer might Google if they were trying to learn some good cross examination questions. Or maybe the client wants to know how much something like that might cost. Next search, a little later still:

What if officer does not appear at ALR hearing?

A lawyer would know the answer – I hope – to this one, so maybe this really is a defendant trying to figure out how things work. Assuming the officer has been properly subpoenaed, and DPS doesn’t have ‘good cause’ for his absence, it should be dismissed. (But don’t hold your breath – I’ve objected to and been overruled on some pretty flimsy ‘good cause’ issues at SOAH.)

What if my attorney did not get an ALR hearing?

Well now things have taken a turn for the worse. The next search/same IP provides us some insight into the mystery:

My attorney did not request ALR because I passed breath test did not take a blood test

“I see,” said the blind man. I think I’ve figured this out. You told your lawyer that you passed the breath test – blew under .08 – and I hope for your sake that you told him about the blood test part.

Was your license confiscated? Did they ask for blood after you passed the breath test? If you refused the second test, they may have issued the DIC paperwork and started the license suspension process. Including that 15 day period you’ve been reading about – at least since you started doing your own internet research.

I think it’s good advice for the lawyer to request an ALR in every case, including when the potential client comes in and says, “I passed the test”. First, I’ve had cases where clients told me, “They said I blew .07”, but we find out later there was some confusion about the “.0” part. (i.e., “.17”)

Second, if DIC paperwork was issued, it has to be done. DPS is basically just a big bunch of computers. There are humans too, of course, but by and large they are there to correct the computer errors. Some clerk receives a Notice of Suspension from a police agency, enters the info, and that 15 day time limit starts ticking.

Third, DPS considers passing the breath test but refusing the next round of blood tests to actually be a refusal. And more importantly, back to point number two, if the computers were fed the information about the notice of suspension, and you/your lawyer didn’t do anything then the “Automatic” License Revocation kicked in.

Something like this came up recently – although I can’t find the email so the details might have differed - on either the Texas criminal defense lawyer listserv or the Texas DWI defender listserv, and Houston DWI lawyer Troy McKinney properly referred the questioner to Texas Transportation Code 524.012:

(c) The department may not suspend a person's driver's license if:

(1) the person is an adult and the analysis of the person's breath or blood specimen determined that the person had an alcohol concentration of a level below that specified by Section 49.01(2)(B), Penal Code, at the time the specimen was taken;

Unfortunately section (d) continues:

(d) A determination under this section is final unless a hearing is requested under Section 524.031

So it’s a moot point without the request. Sounds like your lawyer woulda, coulda, shoulda… Or maybe I’m missing something, who knows?

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Can You Flag Down That Prosecutor For Me?

Iwas in District Court most of the morning and saw an interesting set of events. As they unfolded, I paid more and more attention, but I’m sure I missed some details at the beginning. Here goes:

First: A prosecutor, a cop, defense lawyer Oscar Buitron, and the defendant at the bench. Testimony was being taken in a DWI case. Something about a CAD report and whether or not the officer really had called in to dispatch to check the license and registration on a vehicle as he had previously sworn under oath.

I suspected, and later confirmed, that it was some sort of continuation of a pretrial hearing that had already occurred. The officer was insisting that he indeed had called in to check the vehicle, but he was squirming, uncomfortable. Just a little bit. He’d testified before, so he was almost holding his own.

But it was obvious from the questioning that Oscar thought he could prove the officer was being… let’s say… untruthful. And more importantly that he had the goods to prove it. Then out came the CAD report itself (of course).

I had other things going on, but my interest was piqued and I managed to catch something about “if you press this button here”, “then you press that button there”, “blah blah blah”. They were up at the bench, no microphones, I didn’t catch everything being said.

After testimony concludes, there’s some chatter about resetting it to another-another-pretrial setting so that Oscar can bring in some more witnesses (APD officers no less) who will be able to show that the arresting officer’s testimony – that he had called it in, that dispatch had called him back and said the registration wasn’t current, but that he had then manually deleted that information from the CAD report itself – was impossible. (Never mind nonsensical. “Gee, let me take some time out of my busy day to erase the confirmation that this was a good stop.”)

Second: Probably 15/20 minutes later I’m chatting with that prosecutor about something completely unrelated, and the bailiff walks up to him and says, “The officer wants to talk to you”. He motions to the jury room. The prosecutor excuses himself from our conversation and leaves.

Third: Another half hour later… the defendant is back at the bench entering a plea. To back time on a misdemeanor.

Now I don’t need to see parts one and two to know that as a general rule when a defendant walks up to the bench in Felony Court and pleads to a misdemeanor, that he’s getting a significantly above average deal in his case. Never mind that it was back time: no probation, no more jail. Oscar was obviously well prepared and had gotten a good result.

By the way, I left it out of the initial description, but the prosecutor had brought out other traffic violations for the court to hang its hat on, so this was – despite the testilying – no slam dunk win for the defense.

I talked to Oscar afterwards (who among us doesn’t love it when one of our brothers or sisters ekes out a victory) and found out some more details. It was a habitual case. The defendant had (at least) two prior pen trips and was looking at a minimum of 25 years if convicted on the indictment.

More invigorating (perplexing? commonplace?) still was that Oscar hadn’t known this would pop up during the first pretrial. The officer had already listed in his PC affidavit, and testified to traffic violations that weren’t demonstrably false, when he decided to just “add” the testimony about calling in the license to dispatch. (This is a favorite police “excuse” in my experience. Which is foolish because it’s one of the easiest to catch them on.) Nothing mentioned about it though in the PC or the offense report.

Oscar’s BS detector went off. He asked the judge to continue it, rechecked the tape which confirmed his memory that the officer appeared to discover that the vehicle was unregistered well after the stop, and ordered the CAD.

Mostly though, it’s that second step listed above that intrigues me so. The cop in the back room sweating and “needing to talk” to the prosecutor.

What exactly did that officer tell the prosecutor, when the bailiff alerted him that he needed to “confer”? I’ve never worked for the State, so I can only imagine the possibilities…

• “Hey I’m not sure how intoxicated he was after all. Can you work out a deal?”
• “Please drop this case… I don’t want to come back on it. Ever.”
• “Quick question for you… what’s the penalty for perjury again?”

A Feisty Question About Refusing the Breath Test

Despite the banner proclaiming that the writer “won’t hide behind an alias” I couldn’t figure out the blogger’s name; his alias is Feisty – or based on the URL, is it perhaps Feisty Geek? – but he sure brings up a good point in his “DWI Hypothetical”.

The hypo assumes that Joe Blow gets stopped by the police while driving, investigated for DWI, refuses (politely, we hope) to do any of the proffered field sobriety tests, and then, after being arrested is asked whether or not he wants to take a breath test:

The officer then asks Joe to take a breath test for intoxication. Joe's thinks for a moment, and responds:

Joe: Am I under arrest?

Officer: Yes

Joe: Do I have the right to remain silent?

Officer: Yes

Joe: Do I have the right to an attorney before I answer any questions?

Officer: Yes

Joe: Well, I now invoke my right to remain silent and to have an attorney before answering any questions.

Officer: Will you submit to a breath test?

Joe: Officer, that sounds like a question. I have already said that I invoke my right to counsel before answering any questions.

Officer: Huh?

Great hypothetical, and we can see where the lay-legal reasoning is leading us. Heck, it’s where the legal-legal reasoning leads me too.

If I’m under arrest, and I now have the right not to answer any questions without an attorney present, I probably shouldn’t answer questions without legal advice. Especially questions like “Will you take the breath test?”

Sounds like this is exactly the situation where I should consult a lawyer familiar with DWI procedures. Feisty continues and takes a stab at answering his own hypothetical question:

If you don't refuse the test, but instead just refuse to answer the officer's question as to whether you will take the test, that might not pass muster as a refusal, particularly when you've invoked your constitutional rights as the basis for not answering the question.

Anyone know if this might work?

Unfortunately, at least in Texas, there is caselaw directly on point that is not favorable to this position, at least from the DWI suspect’s standpoint. A refusal to answer the question at all is “taken as” or “deemed to be” a refusal. And that will hold up in an ALR hearing. And on appeal.

Alas our Joe Blow is tagged with a 180 day No-Blow ALR refusal driver’s license suspension. Well, 180 days… assuming it’s a first time DWI. There’s a potential enhancement to a full two years if our hero has a prior alcohol related contact.

But Feisty hits the nail on the head with his last observation:

Obviously, anyone coherent enough to go through that conversation without slipping up probably isn't that intoxicated, even though they might blow a .08 if they tested.

Exactly. The DIC-24 Statutory Warning reads “If you refuse to give a specimen, that refusal may be admissible in a subsequent prosecution.” The intent is to blackmail the suspect into giving a sample.

But in fact, as Feisty points out, it’s just as easily evidence that you are not intoxicated

But Officer, I Can't Do That When I'm Sober (A True Story)

Several years back I took the same class that police officers take to become certified to administer the Field Sobriety Tests. It’s not an impressive feat; I just did it to learn more about DWI defense.

The class was taught by Troy Walden and Lance Platt, two ex-police officers who, then and now, specialize in helping lawyers defend DWIs in Texas. It used the same manuals, and they themselves were certified Instructors, so it was pretty much identical in every aspect. (I’m tempted to say the students probably paid more attention than some officers do, but I can’t scientifically prove it.)

The three day class even included the part where we the students administer tests to some subjects before and after drinking. That’s right. They bring them in with nothing to drink. All subjects get the HGN, Walk and Turn, One Leg Stand. Then, while the students go on to some other rigorous examination of FSTs, the subjects sit at a bar and get dosed with alcohol.

In other words, someone sits there and buys them drinks. Then they come back and do the tests all over again.

I was reminded of this experience when my longtime friend and office mate, as well as fellow Austin DWI lawyer Lance Stott wrote this post about his experience as a guinea pig:

My role, difficult as it was, was to be a test subject, get drunk, and then take the tests again. It was a tough job, but somebody had to do it.

I’m a little bit clumsy by nature. I didn’t listen to the instructions all that well, and performing the tests in front a group of people gave me a case of nervers. Long story short: I bombed.

I took the wrong number of steps, started before I was instructed to, did the turn improperly, and I think I stepped off the line, as well. There are 8 clues on the walk and turn, and I think I got them all.

I was there. On the second day of class they had asked if any of us could bring in our friends to be subjects, so I asked Lance if he wanted to come, and he agreed. So I designated-ly drove him to and from the class. (Another lawyer brought a friend from one of Austin’s local “bars”; she scored terribly on the tests before and after.)

I don’t remember whether he got all eight clues, but I do remember he did terribly on the first – i.e. sober – attempt. I specifically remember him getting the number of steps wrong, even though I knew he knew it’s called the nine step walk and turn.

As an aside, I also remember that someone, not Lance, had natural nystagmus in one eye. Everyone ooohed and aaaahed, as that poor guy got HGN’d to within an inch of his life. Everyone had to see it.

Police officers, when asked about natural nystagmus, will pooh pooh it in that tone of voice that let’s you know only about ten people on earth probably have natural nystagmus, and all of them know it and will announce that before they have the HGN administered to them. Apparently one of the ten just randomly made it into our class. And, no, he had no idea he had visible nystagmus at all times in one eye. But I digress.

Back to Stott. How did he do after the trip to the bar?

The second time around, I did much better. I began when I was supposed to. I took the right number of steps. I touched heel to toe, and I even did the turn more or less the way you’re supposed to. (By the way, nobody ever does the turn right.)

What happened? Well, after my trip to the bar, I wasn’t the least bit nervous anymore. More importantly, this was my second time around. I’d had a bit of practice, and this time I knew what they were looking for.

Right again. That’s exactly how it happened. I was the witness. I don’t remember the second time around HGN results for him, but other than that, I think he got zero out of eight clues on the Walk and Turn, and either zero or one clue - a passing score - on the One Leg Stand after being dosed with alcohol.