Pick your Atlanta DUI Attorney carefully

One of the most important things you can do to ensure a smooth legal case is to pick your attorney carefully. Your primary goal is to hire someone you are convinced will get you the best possible result. In order to do this, you need to ask a lot of questions.

If you have already determined that the lawyer you are speaking to has valid experience in Georgia DUI law, make sure he has spent significant time in jury trial.

Ask: How many cases have you taken to jury trial?

This is a crucial question and one which separates the best from the rest in DUI defense. Your case might need to go to trial in order to get the outcome you deserve. It's imperative that your attorney have a significant amount of jury trial experience.

I’ve been a practicing trial lawyer since 1989.

I’ve handled thousands of DUI and other serious traffic cases in my career. I’ve seen the trouble inexperienced lawyers can unintentionally cause their clients.

If a lawyer tells you his jury experience is not relevant because you do not really want a jury trial, your interview is over. This is classic nonsense from a lawyer who clearly has little, if any, jury trial experience. Lawyers like this avoid jury trials even when they are in their client’s best interest.

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Who in Atlanta is most likely to be forced to give blood?

I blogged last about how in the near future you may be forced to give blood if you refuse the sobriety tests. Where is this most likely to happen? In Douglass County and anywhere the Georgia DUI task force happens to be. These are the two agencies in Metro Atlanta who already seek warrants for blood draws.

The reasoning they give in this AJC article for why they seek blood tests is two-fold. And scary.

First, more people are refusing the breath tests.

“…our levels of refusals were increasing, and with a refusal it’s hard to convict them,” complains one cop. The police blame DUI lawyers who advise their clients that if they’ve been drinking to refuse the tests. We don’t do that. We simply believe the tests are invasive, unscientific, and often faulty. But that is another story.

DUI arrests on the downswing

Second, they seek blood tests because “DUI fatalities and arrests in Georgia have trended down in recent years.” WHAT? They want to give more blood tests because fewer people are drinking and then driving? That makes NO sense whatsoever. So….current policies are working, folks are aware of their rights, and the campaign to end drunk driving is working. I know! Let’s see if we can nab more people even though fewer people are driving drunk. Some logic.

Sounds like it might just be time to start going after the new poster boys of bad driving: distracted drivers. I wonder if there is a blood test to see if you’ve been switching your radio stations while driving?

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DON'T RELY ON THIS TEST TO DETERMINE IF YOU'RE UNDER THE LEGAL LIMIT

All the gizmos in the world can’t prevent someone whose drunk too much from driving, but that doesn’t stop inventors from thinking up new ways to prey on our fears about being stopped by the cops on our way home.

If you’ve been out drinking with friends at a restaurant or bar and are afraid of getting an Atlanta DUI you could use this new gizmo, that is, when it is available in Atlanta. It’s a free standing breathalyzer installed at your drinking hole that will tell you your BAC for $5. Sort of like the old weight-and-fortune- machines in the days of old, I suppose. It’s a clever idea and there is nothing really wrong with it, only it doesn’t really do anything. Why? Let me tell you:

1. When you breathe into a breathalyzer, it tells you your BAC for right then. What if you have another drink? What if you don’t drive for another half hour? Your BAC changes over time and it could very well go up as well as down.
2. Who is calibrating this machine? How can you be confident of its results?
3. Does the machine give you a false sense of security? If you’ve had a drink and are worried about being over the limit, just don’t drive. Machines can be wrong.
4. What is stopping a person from using the machine, seeing and understanding that he is over the limit, and then driving anyway?

These types of kiosks encourage "power drinking" in my opinion.  Instead of piquing curiosity, I’ve seen folks blow into one, then head back to the bar for more shots to see how high they can go. It’s a better practice is to think of this as a novelty, and let your designated driver take you home. That that goes for any gizmo that tells you your BAC—a pocket machine you bought at the drug store, a little chart or even an app.

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"Should you should take the field tests or take the breath test?"

It's still the holiday season, and like many of you, I've been making the party rounds in Atlanta and Gwinett County.  If I get asked once, I get asked a thousand times whether "you should take the field tests or take the breath test" if you get stopped for DUI in metro Atlanta as soon as someone finds out what I do for a living.

The answer is, "it depends."  And it's starting to get more complicated.

If you exercise your right to refuse a breath or blood test after a DUI arrest, some police are going to the local judge and getting a search warrant to forcibly take your blood.  Can they do this?  So far, yes.  What if you're deathly afraid of needles?  Who's going to draw your blood?  Can they really strap you onto a gurney and prevent you from interfering?

Many police officers are taking classes in how to draw blood and they're being certified as phlebotomists (fancy word for blood-drawers).  This means you may not even be taken to a hospital for a blood test; they'll take your blood at the police precinct, or more likely, the jail, by the same cop who arrested you, not a nurse or technician.

Worse, you'll be designated a "refusal" for administrative license suspension purposes, which means you could lose your license for a year just for saying no, and then the test result could be used to criminally prosecute you.

The police may stop this if enough of the refusals end up with forced blood test results below the legal limit, after all, many people say no to a breath test because they are not under the influence and they know their legal rights.  They know they don't have to give up evidence that could be used to prosecute them.  They're not trying to hide something, but to maintain their privacy.

Prevention is the best solution; don't put yourself in the position of not knowing whether you're over or under the legal limit when it's time to drive.  Barring that, if you can live without your driver's license (and I'm not saying that the arrest is legal or that you will lose your license at some point), maintain your privacy and exercise your right to refuse that test.

We're Atlanta DUI Lawyers Clark & Towne

Find out more about our firm

We're on the big three social networking sites and now You Tube too!
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