43
   

I just don’t understand drinking and driving

 
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 06:06 am
@firefly,
A little push back on this silliness..........


http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/53458336-90/butterfield-checkpoints-civil-driving.html.csp

A Utah lawmaker wants to do away with roadblocks that law enforcement uses to crack down on drunken drivers, saying they are ineffective and infringe on civil liberties.

"As legislators, we have to decide where the balance is," said freshman Rep. David Butterfield, R-Logan. "We have to decide where's the right balance between having every tool at your disposal and protecting civil liberties. And the data I've looked at show they're not effective for reducing DUI [cases]."

Butterfield's proposal ran into stiff opposition Monday from Utah's law enforcement community. The Law Enforcement Legislative Committee — which consists of police chiefs, prosecutors, sheriffs and Highway Patrol — unanimously opposed the measure.

"This is, for whatever reason, the Legislature taking away a tool law enforcement uses to reduce the incidence of driving under the influence, both alcohol and drugs," said Layton Police Chief Terry Keefe, president of the Utah Chiefs of Police Association.

If Butterfield's HB140 becomes law, police officers could stop a vehicle only if they have a warrant, if there is reasonable suspicion criminal activity has occurred, or if there is an emergency.

Checkpoints could still be used to investigate things such as wildlife violations or invasive species, provided the checkpoints are approved by a magistrate.

Keefe said Layton does two to three checkpoints a year. Each one has to have a written plan approved by a judge and notice of the checkpoint has to be published in advance. He is not aware of the process being abused, but if it were, the charges would presumably be thrown out.

"I would hate for us to lose the tool," Keefe said, "and why the Legislature would want to reduce law enforcement's ability under a judicially approved plan is beyond me."

As a member of the Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Committee, Butterfield said every tool that is brought to the panel is pitched as a way to help law enforcement.

"We've got to be really careful," he said, "about how we infringe on the constitutional and civil liberties of our citizens."

Butterfield said he is convinced, from the data he has seen, that saturation patrols in critical areas are a more effective way to get drunken drivers off the road and a better use of officers.

Keefe said he agrees saturation patrols can be effective and noted his jurisdiction uses both.

Butterfield said that about a dozen states don't do checkpoints, either because they have been prohibited by statute or determined to violate the state's constitution.

The Utah Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of checkpoints in 2000 and found that they were constitutional if they follow clearly stated, reasonable rules — although in that case it tossed out a traffic stop that the justices said didn't follow the rules set up in the law.

Marina Lowe, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah, said the ACLU has traditionally opposed checkpoints as a violation of the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure.

"You should have some suspicion," she said, "before you stop somebody and subject them to an intrusive search."

Art Brown, the state director of the group Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said high-visibility law enforcement deters drunk driving and prevents injuries or death.

"They are really effective in deterring people," he said. "It's really part of MADD's strategy to eliminate drunk driving to have high-visibility checkpoints."

[email protected]


0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 06:25 am
OH in relationship to check points I was driving to a bar on southwest 8 st with BAC of .00 when the police decided to have a check point in such a manner that the line of back up cars begin just before the turn point into the bar parking lot on the other side of the road,

I did not feel like waiting to go through this nonsense and then turning around to get to the bar so I went out of the line into the parking lot anyway as that was where I was going in the first place and if they wish to go and get me it would be pointless as once more my BAC was .00

They did not bother and after having two drinks I took note that they had add some traffic cones at the point that I did the turn in the parking lot a hour or two before.

Another footnote the bar had the same number of people in it that was normal for that day of the week.
0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 07:07 am
Full speed to a police state......

http://www.examiner.com/article/austin-cops-no-refusal-july-4th-dwi-testing-targets-civil-liberties

Austin cops' "No Refusal" July 4th DWI testing targets civil liberties
No RefusalJuly 4, 2012
By: Lyndon Henry0 Email.Get Policy & Issues alerts!
E-mail *

+•No Refusal•austin police.AdvertisementAustin Police Department (APD) is once again seizing upon a popular holiday (July 4th) to implement the mandatory blood-testing of motorists suspected of driving while intoxicated (DWI).

In a July 3rd announcement, APD claimed that "The DWI initiative is an effort to enforce DWI laws, keep the public safe, and to conduct blood search warrants on suspects who refuse to give a breath or blood specimen as required by law." The crackdown will run from 9 pm on July 4th to 5 am on July 5th.

Ironically, this abuse of personal freedom occurs on the day when Americans celebrate their supposed freedom and independence from the authoritarianism of 18th-century British rule.

Authorized by Texas state law, the "No Refusal" blood-draw policy can be applied against any DWI suspect who declines to take a breath test to determine blood alcohol level. The individual can be forcibly restrained while his or her blood is drawn.

Civil liberties critics of the No Refusal policy include many criminal defense attorneys and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), as well as some leftist political organizations.

In a 2010 report, ABC News interviewed Marjorie Esman, executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana.

One of the problems with No Refusal, according to Esman, is "the potential invalidity of the search warrants."

"If they're being issued assembly-line style, there may not be the kind of individualized investigation in each particular case that's necessary for a valid search warrant" she warned.

Another concern raised by Esman is medical privacy.

"We don't know what they're doing with the blood samples" she noted "-- whether they're data-banking it, what kind of information they're going to glean from it."

Criticizing the policy as "One of the greatest civil liberty threats" in the Austin area, a February 2010 Examiner article by reporter Andrea Farkas noted that "What began as an outrageous action — intrusive, non-consensual blood draw " had evolved into "an everyday, accepted procedure."


Farkas also pointed out that the inaugural application of the policy during Halloween 2008 had gone without public backlash. "Citizens failed to protest this unconstitutional, barbaric practice, or worse still, failed to realize its damning existence" she warned.

"To draw blood is intrusive, and this intrusion on civil liberties cannot be tolerated."

Some organizations of the far left argue that No Refusal and related policies like so-called Sobriety Checkpoints — carried out under the ruse of "protecting" public safety — are part of a wide-ranging effort to control and regiment the population, particularly the working class.

In a June 2011 article, the Spartacist League newspaper Workers Vanguard argued that modern crackdowns against alcohol, tobacco, sweetened beverages, and other products represented efforts by the wealthy elite to enforce "the ever-growing regimentation of the population for greater
profits and productivity ...."

BillRM
 
  0  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 08:42 am
@OmSigDAVID,
Quote:
Will u define "Virginia's" for us ?


David I look to see if it was some gay slang without luck.

firefly
 
  2  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 08:42 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
Once more another fine example of the police wasting resources going after the low end BAC drivers that can not be proven to be over the limit without blood/breathe tests.

Now you don't understand why the police need breath or blood tests when they suspect someone is DUI--and that they need these tests from all drivers they arrest for DUI? Rolling Eyes

I don't know if you are drunk, but even you can't be that stupid and ignorant.

The breath or blood tests are how they establish the driver's BAC--that's how they know exactly what the BAC is--and the DUI laws are based on BAC levels. And the police want, and need, these tests as objective forensic evidence that the driver is, in fact, DUI--from alcohol. The person might be under the influence of a substance other than alcohol, or they might not be legally drunk. So breath/blood tests are taken from all suspected DUI drivers prior to an arrest, if at all possible. The breath/blood evidence is needed whether the person was arrested at a checkpoint or because they were driving the wrong way on a parkway, and it is needed for the same reasons in both instances--it's the major objective evidence of intoxication.

They can arrest on the results of a field sobriety test, or simply the person's appearance and behavior, but they have a much harder time prosecuting someone, even if that person had been driving while extremely intoxicated, without the results of breath/blood tests. That's why leaving the scene of a DUI accident becomes a serious matter--they are not able to get a Breathalyzer result at the scene to establish that the driver was DUI prior to the accident. So, the prosecution of that driver becomes much more difficult. Without breath/blood tests they have to estimate what the driver's BAC level might have been--and that's less objective and less convincing evidence than the results of breath/blood tests. And that's an issue in Thom Swift's case which was discussed at length in this thread. And it's an issue when people refuse to take a Breathalyzer test at the scene or when asked to at a DUI stop.

It's because they are trying to stop people from evading prosecution or penalties for DUI that the police are getting these electronic warrants allowing them to take a blood test if a Breathalyzer is refused. In some cases, they will draw the blood forcibly if the driver won't cooperate, and many states, if not all, have also increased the penalties for refusing the Breathalyzer.

You don't seem to understand the most basic law enforcement procedures related to making a DUI arrest--any DUI arrest. You've already shown in your other posts that you can't understand or interpret statistical data. You don't understand why issues--like leaving the scene--which are relevant to the case this thread is based on, are important, because they affect the gathering of evidence, including the driver's BAC, and that affects the subsequent prosecution of the case.

If you don't understand why law enforcement needs breath or blood tests from all drivers suspected of DUI, YOU DON"T UNDERSTAND THIS TOPIC AT ALL.

THIS TOPIC IS WAY OVER YOUR HEAD.

Since you keep claiming you aren't drunk, Drunk Drunk Drunk, then you really should admit you aren't intelligent or informed enough to understand or follow this discussion.

0 Replies
 
firefly
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 09:17 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
Full speed to a police state......

You consider something a "police state" if it has laws against rape/sexual assault, child pornography, and driving beyond a legal BAC limit of .08. So, your definition of a "police state" is not something most people would take seriously. Most sane and rational people want to live in a lawful, and law-abiding, society. You are not in that category. You think like a sociopath, in terms of trying to evade laws, and you repeatedly post info on how to encrypt your computer to hide stored contents from the government, as well as posting all sorts of useful tips on how to find illegal items on the darknet.

The only laws you endorse are those that allow you to carry guns, to own as many and as varied types of guns as possible, as much ammo as possible, and to "stand your ground" and shoot unarmed strangers.

So, some people have civil rights objections to laws allowing blood tests to be drawn when Breathalyzer tests are refused. Fine, let them litigate these matters in court. Until those laws are overturned by a court, they will be enforced. There are compelling issues of public safety behind the need to be able to successfully prosecute and penalize drunk drivers--and breath/blood tests are really necessary to be able to do that. So don't bother to continue to harp on this issue, in your usual obsessive manner--these laws are currently in effect, and nothing you will say here is going to change that.



BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 09:49 am
@firefly,
Quote:
if it has laws against rape/sexual assault, child pornography, and driving beyond a legal BAC limit of .08


I love how you are so willing to lie even when anyone who can read can see how false your statements happen to be.

For the record I do not think that it is rape when an adult woman withdrawn her consent after the fact under the theory her own completely voluntary drinking had invalidate her consent.

No problem with the laws that define rape as using force or threat of force or even sexual intercourse where the lady is not aware of what she is doing or not doing. A far far higher standard then I got a buzz on and then regret having sex afterward so it must be rape nonsense.

I think that the CP laws are too harsh for the most part and in that I am in agreement with most federal judges by poll and our law should take more after the UK standards.

I think that .08 a limit that was force repeat force on the states by the federal government is set too low.

Quote:
There are compelling issues of public safety behind the need to be able to successfully prosecute and penalize drunk drivers--a


Now the sad part is that there is little public safety issue when dealing with the low end of DUI BAC driving and that in searching for drivers so little impair it can not be proven by their actions but only by blood or breathe testing that the drivers are over the limit and tying up police resources in doing so instead of having that manpower out on the roadways looking to get the clearly impair drivers off the roadway that are the real danger to the public.

Such high end BAC drivers can be convicted without any blood or breathe testing by way of a video camera.
firefly
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 10:17 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
Such high end BAC drivers can be convicted without any blood or breathe testing by way of a video camera.

No asshole, the DUI laws are written in terms of BAC levels. You really need and require the driver's BAC level in order to be able to successfully enforce the laws.

Try reading the law sometime.
Quote:
Now the sad part is that there is little public safety issue when dealing with the low end of DUI BAC driving and that in searching for drivers so little impair it can not be proven by their actions but only by blood or breathe testing that the drivers are over the limit and tying up police resources in doing so instead of having that manpower out on the roadways looking to get the clearly impair drivers off the roadway that are the real danger to the public.

1. There is a public safety issue with all drunk drivers. You are too stubborn and/or stupid to understand the info, that has already been posted, on the significant impairments in driving abilities--that can be already demonstrated in all drivers with a BAC=.08.

2. The overwhelming majority of DUI arrests are already made while police patrol the streets and highways, or after they respond to an accident. They make relatively few arrests at checkpoints, and checkpoints are so infrequent they don't tie up resources. The checkpoints are more to act as a deterrent to drunk driving, particularly around holidays, long weekends, and a very occasional Friday or Saturday night. The point you keep trying to make is meaningless. You are complaining about an essentially non-existent problem. Try dealing with reality and not a straw-man.

YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND THIS TOPIC AT ALL. IT IS OVER YOUR HEAD AND YOU DON'T KNOW WHEN TO SHUT UP.
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 11:35 am
@firefly,
Quote:
The overwhelming majority of DUI arrests are already made while police patrol the streets and highways, or after they respond to an accident


An for the most part those arrested are not of the low end BAC drivers but if memory serve me correctly is somewhere near to double the legal limit of .08 on average.

You need road blocks and blood tests to find the lower end BAC drivers as they are for the most part are not a danger to the public safety. They are not the ones who drive the wrong way on the highway, or have head on by drifting into the oncoming lane or plow into the back of another car at 80 mph plus wiping out families.

You do not need to have rubber stamps electronic search warrants issue at road blocks to find and get the drunks off the road just the low end BAC drivers. Not one and the same thing.

http://www.motorists.org/dui/myths

Myth: Lowering the legal BAC limit for DWI will get the "drunks" off the road.

Truth: People at .1 or .08 are not automatically "drunks" and they are not the people who should be targeted for DWI enforcement. The average DWI violator is arrested with a BAC of .15 to .17 percent. Even in countries with extremely low legal BAC limits (e.g. Sweden at .02), the average DWI arrest involves a BAC of at least .15 percent.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Y
OmSigDAVID
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 12:05 pm
@BillRM,

DAVID wrote:
Will u define "Virginia's" for us ?
BillRM wrote:
David I look to see if it was some gay slang without luck.
Thank u, Bill.





David
0 Replies
 
firefly
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 12:07 pm
@BillRM,
Quote:
You need road blocks and blood tests to find the lower end BAC drivers as they are for the most part are not a danger to the public safety. They are not the ones who drive the wrong way on the highway, or have head on by drifting into the oncoming lane or plow into the back of another car at 80 mph plus wiping out families.

But roadblocks can still find those high BAC level drivers before they head the wrong way on the parkway, or before they speed and smack into someone's car.
And the roadblocks are very very infrequent--and they serve to keep all drivers aware of the need to watch their drinking and driving, particularly around holidays and long weekends, when more drinking goes on, and more cars are on the road, and that alone helps to cut down on drunk driving and drunk driving accidents.

And electronic warrants will probably now be used in all DUI arrests, when necessary, and not just at roadblocks. It's a new DUI enforcement tool.
Quote:
The average DWI violator is arrested with a BAC of .15 to .17 percent...

You still don't understand what "average" means--it doesn't mean that those with lower BAC levels aren't getting into crashes and injuring and killing people or damaging property. And, if you haven't understood it by now, you're never gonna get it.

You aren't saying anything meaningful. You still don't undertand the topic. And you still don't know when to shut up.
0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 01:33 pm
http://reason.com/archives/2010/10/11/abolish-drunk-driving-laws

Consider the 2000 federal law that pressured states to lower their BAC standards to 0.08 from 0.10. At the time, the average BAC in alcohol-related fatal accidents was 0.17, and two-thirds of such accidents involved drivers with BACs of 0.14 or higher. In fact, drivers with BACs between 0.01 and 0.03 were involved in more fatal accidents than drivers with BACs between 0.08 and 0.10. (The federal government classifies a fatal accident as "alcohol-related" if it involved a driver, a biker, or a pedestrian with a BAC of 0.01 or more, whether or not drinking actually contributed to the accident.) In 1995 the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration studied traffic data in 30 safety categories from the first five states to adopt the new DWI standard. In 21 of the 30 categories, those states were either no different from or less safe than the rest of the country.

Once the 0.08 standard took effect nationwide in 2000, a curious thing happened: Alcohol-related traffic fatalities increased, following a 20-year decline. Critics of the 0.08 standard predicted this would happen. The problem is that most people with a BAC between 0.08 and 0.10 don't drive erratically enough to be noticed by police officers in patrol cars. So police began setting up roadblocks to catch them. But every cop manning a roadblock aimed at catching motorists violating the new law is a cop not on the highways looking for more seriously impaired motorists. By 2004 alcohol-related fatalities went down again, but only because the decrease in states that don't use roadblocks compensated for a slight but continuing increase in the states that use them.

0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 02:46 pm
A question had just occur to me out of the blue in the tens of thousands of postings by Firefly can anyone remember her expressing any degree of disagreement to any of the hundreds of thousands of laws and regulations with the force of law at any level of government in the US?

It as if a law once it is on the law books it seems to have a religion dogma type of power in her mind.

Ok can anyone come up with an example where she had express any disagreements or even concerns about an existing law?

How about the punishment levels for any violations of any of those laws?

Come on no one can think that secular laws are god given and should be respect by the true believers as if they came down from the mountain top, so can anyone come up with one law or one regulation or one level of punishment under them that she had disagree with on this website?

In it way this is as odd as having never drop any information about herself in all those tens of thousands of postings.
FOUND SOUL
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 03:33 pm
@BillRM,
You're odd for wanting so desperately to know all about her, or even just "something".

Whilst obviously I live in Australia and our BAC is .07 I agree with Firefly, lower level, higher level, both are risky drivers full stop. Stopping someone just over .08 means you may have just stopped a lower level getting to a higher level, by stopping the car at one more bar, on his/her way home it's all the same, drink driving..

If someone hasn't eaten? .08 can really feel like .127. Law is law, don't drink and drive full stop.
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 03:48 pm
@FOUND SOUL,
Quote:
Law is law, don't drink and drive full stop.


That is however not the current law in any part of the US full full stop.

True the public campaigns had stop stating do not drive drunk to do not drink and drive.

Interesting however that in the states where they use roadblocks to search for low level BAC drivers the death rates had gone up not down and not so in the states that does not use that law enforcement tool is it not?

Next our friend Firefly is one of the primacy drivers on this website so being interest in such a woman that have the very charming habit of taking your personal informations out of content and using them as weapons to try to discredit your positions and yet reveal zero about herself in tens of thousands of postings.

Next do you remember her ever disagreeing with one law in all those postings of her as I surely do not.
firefly
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 03:55 pm
@BillRM,
Quote:
Next do you remember her ever disagreeing with one law in all those postings of her as I surely do not.

Then you missed my postings about the Stand Your Ground law in your state.
BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 04:03 pm
@firefly,
Quote:
Then you missed my postings about the Stand Your olaw in your state.


My my that is right you do not wish citizens to have the right of self defense.

How could I had forgotten that position of your!!!!!!!!!!

But then you are still supporting the state wish to imprison the gentleman law or no law so that might had been why my mind did not trigger on that stand of you.
0 Replies
 
FOUND SOUL
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 04:17 pm
@BillRM,
Quote:
don't drink and drive


Quote:
That is however not the current law in any part of the US full full stop.


So. There is no law according to you, anywhere in the US, that enforces penalties against anyone that has driven "drunk" on any BAC level? Is that your position?

If there is no law Bill. How, then can they empose any fines, gaol terms, yellow plates or white, for motor vehicles, showing they were done for DUI.

BillRM
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 04:58 pm
@FOUND SOUL,
.
Quote:
There is no law according to you, anywhere in the US, that enforces penalties against anyone that has driven "drunk" on any BAC level? Is that your position?

If there is no law Bill. How, then can they empose any fines, gaol terms, yellow plates or white, for motor vehicles, showing they were done for DUI.



No you stated "do not drink and drive stop" and that is not the law anywhere in the US as you can indeed drink and drive or otherwise the DUI BAC limit would . .000000 not .08 for 21 one years old adults at least.

Once more the public adv campaigns had stop stating Do not drive drunk to do not drink and drive but that is not the current laws in the US.
FOUND SOUL
 
  1  
Reply Thu 6 Sep, 2012 05:09 pm
@BillRM,
Quote:
Law is law, don't drink and drive full stop.


Quote:
No you stated "do not drink and drive stop"


Did I?

How can you not comprehend.. Law is law...If you drink and drive you will be caught. Don't drink and drive, full stop.... I have to spell it out in detail?

Quote:
Once more the public adv campaigns had stop stating Do not drive drunk to do not drink and drive but that is not the current laws in the US.


I have no friggen idea what you are on about. Public advertising campaigns are there to make people "aware", "remind" people. Off course they stop, they cost money, until such time as it is time to "remind"yet again.

So do not drive drunk (past) to
Do not drink and drive is the 'Govenment's' campaign. Isn't that a stronger message?

And, it is the law, you drink and drive and are caught over the limit, you be gone.... Anyone knows that, anyone knows you can have a glass of wine and drive or two small ones and that men's metabalism is different to that of a woman and that eating prior to a drink is different than drinking on an empty stomach, ra, ra, ra..

"I just don't understand, drinking and driving"

Me neither.. It's stupid...

Do you really think that people here are that stupid that they don't understand what drink driving means and how to behave in order to not be over the limit and go against the law?

There is absolutely ziltch conversation here, you're just passing time, nit-picking, trying to find holes in something that is a useless conversation because every idiot knows the law with alcohol and driving.
 

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