The Colorado Department of Transportation mounted its first DUI enforcement campaign January 14-17. Called The Heat is On Winter Blitz, the initiative also included Colorado State Patrol and local law enforcement. There was a 16% uptick in traffic fatalities involving...
Many assume they are guilty as soon as they fail a breathalyzer test on the roadside. While the prosecution can use the results against the defendant in court, these devices are not 100% accurate. Several factors can cause a false reading. Poor calibration: These...
Following is a scenario relevant to the discussion of forcible restraint used by Colorado police officers to extract blood from a suspected drunk driver. The story outlined below conveys in summary form a real-life situation that played out on a Fort Collins roadside....
For years, law enforcement has considered the results of breathalyzer tests and field sobriety tests to be irrefutable proof that a person was driving under the influence. However, recent studies have called into question the reliability of breathalyzer results....
It’s notable, isn’t it, how often the general public simply accepts what law enforcers tell them at face value? That is especially apparent in the evidentiary realm, where prosecutors and other government officials often step up to say that a criminal law case has...
It is stressful to see the flashing lights of a police car in your rear-view mirror, and it is natural to have questions as you pull to the shoulder of the road. Are you in trouble? Do the police have a reason to stop you? Will the police arrest you? In these...
Controversy has dogged the breathalyzer ever since an amateur chemist invented the device in 1954. Faulty readings convinced some courts to bar prosecutors from using results against people accused of driving under the influence. Authorities in the Great Lakes region...
We’ve got a problem across the United States concerning accuracy surrounding many arrests tied to drunk driving charges, and it’s not exactly a secret.Defense lawyers know it beyond the slightest doubt. Prosecutors know it. Judges are routinely confronted with the...
We recently informed readers of our criminal defense blogs at Shazam Kianpour & Associates in Denver that we would keep them timely updated on a key Colorado change in DUI-linked blood-alcohol testing.As we noted in our August 5 blog entry, that adjustment was...
The thinking of Colorado lawmakers that spurred a recent and material change to the state’s legal blood-alcohol testing regime is clear enough.But it strongly begs this question: Was it wise?What became notably different on July 1 was the dramatically liberalized use...
