DUI History: DUI LAWS 1990-PRESENT

From "The DUI App," available from iTunes

In 1990 the United States Supreme Court leapt into action by ruling that "sobriety checkpoints" did not violate the United States Constitution's Fourth Amendment.  An individual state was still permitted to protect its citizens from random searches and seizures under their state's constitution, but this was still a huge victory for advocates of roadblocks. 

In the fall of 1992, the United States Department of Transportation (DOT) issued a report that recommended each state adopt a 0.08% BAC per se statute.  The DOT Report concluded, among other things, that "[1]owering the BAC is likely to reduce fatalities....There is also evidence that lowering BACs, and publicizing the effort, can reduce alcohol related deaths at all BACs." In this regard, the Report notes that 80% of the 22,086 alcohol related fatalities in 1990 involved BACs in excess of 0.10%. 

In 1995 President Bill Clinton announced that all states needed to adopt the 0.08% per se BAC.  Federal legislation was subsequently adopted in October 2000 which threatened to withhold billions of additional federal dollars from states that did not enact new laws implementing the 0.08% per se BAC standard.  Most states complied within the next two legislative sessions and in 2005 Minnesota became the final state to pass the law.

In 1998 Congress amended the alcohol-impaired driving incentive grant program which provided extra funding for states that meet certain legislative enactment criteria.  In passing TEA-21 (Transportation Equity Act for the 21^st Century) a state could qualify for a federal grant by meeting five of seven criteria.  The criteria for the basic grant included a program targeting drivers with high BAC levels.

To qualify under the high-BAC criteria states must demonstrate the establishment of a graduated sanctioning system that provides enhanced or additional sanctions (punishments) to drivers convicted of DUI if they were found to have a high BAC.  Further, the enhanced sanctions must be mandatory, must apply to the first (and subsequent) DUI offense, and may include longer terms of license suspensions, increased fines and treatment for substance abuse where appropriate.

In the last couple of decades drug DUI cases have been growing in number.  More and more American motorists are taking prescribed or over-the-counter medications that cause negative and potentially dangerous effects on the driver.  Furthermore, in the last 10 years or so, police officers have been trained on "drug recognition" techniques that assist them in identifying drivers who have taken drugs that impair motor skills. 

Use of common non-prescription medicine such as aspirin, ibuprophen or acetaminophen can have an additive effect to a person's impairment from alcohol while many non-prescription drugs (ie. antihistamines) can impair a person who later consumes alcohol.  This "combination" of alcohol and many types of medications, including prescription and illegal drugs, can drastically increase the impairment effects on a driver.  In 2003, Nevada became the first state to pass DUI drugs laws setting presumptive impairment levels for a variety of contraband substances such as marijuana, followed in 2005 by a similar law in Virginia.

The criminalization of a DUI charge is now taking a different road by making a DUI offense a felony.  Currently, thirty-seven states have DUI statutes that incorporate a felony charge if the driver has prior DUI convictions. 

Although these statutes differ among states, there are some similarities, those being that states use two major factors to determine if the DUI will result in a felony.   The first factor, used by all of the felony DUI states, is the number of prior DUI convictions at the time of the offense. The number required to raise a DUI to a felony ranges from the second to the fifth conviction, with the majority of states setting the limit at the third or fourth DUI conviction.  The second factor, required by thirty states, is the DUI offender must have a specific number of prior convictions within a certain period of years before the current DUI conviction will be a felony. These time periods range from three to twelve years with the majority of states having either a five or ten year limit.  Two states, Idaho and Kentucky, incorporate a third factor in the felony DUI determination. Both states use the BAC level of the driver at the time of the offense to define a felony threshold.  These felony convictions also increase the potential jail time facing the individual accused of DUI.

For information on your Washington State DUI please contact our Snohomish County DUI attorneys, Whatcom County DUI attorneys, King County DUI attorneys, Whatcom Island County DUI attorneys, Island County DUI attorneys, or Skagit County DUI attorneys at 425-493-1115 or check out our website at http://www.washdui.com