Phoenix Criminal Defense Lawyer Explains what a First Offense DUI is in Arizona

Phoenix criminal defense attorney David Black explains how Arizona handles a first-offense DUI, including traffic stops, actual physical control, BAC evidence, field sobriety tests, implied consent, and potential penalties. If you would like additional information on DUI; visit our site: https://www.dbphoenixcriminallawyer.c... Chapters: 00:00 First-Offense DUI Charges in Arizona 00:32 Can the State Prove You Were Driving? 01:04 Understanding Actual Physical Control 02:24 Sleeping in a Car vs. Falling Asleep at a Light 03:16 Arizona’s 0.08 BAC Limit 03:49 Impaired to the Slightest Degree 04:13 Should You Take Field Sobriety Tests? 04:52 Blood, Breath, and Urine Tests 05:20 Potential First-Offense DUI Penalties If you have additional questions about your case, contact us for a free consultation. Law Office of David A. Black 40 North Central Avenue Suite 1850 Phoenix, Arizona 85004 480-280-8028 Transcript: Hi, this is David Black. I'm a criminal defense lawyer in Phoenix, Arizona. And I'm going to be talking about a first offense DUI. So, a basic DUI, uh, somebody who, uh, has never been arrested before, is, let's say, a professional, a lawyer, a young person, a student, and they get charged with DUI. Nothing special about it. So, there's no accident. It's not an extreme DUI. What are the things that the lawyer needs to know or that I would want to know in order to assess how serious the situation is? So DUI is complicated if you don't understand it, but it really boils down to two things that are very obvious. Drinking, driving. So take it in a different order, let's start with driving. Can the state prove that you were driving? I want to know. I want to know if you were behind the wheel and an officer observed you commit a traffic violation because if he didn't, if it's an illegal stop, then I might be able to suppress the fact that you were driving or or the evidence that was taken thereafter. entirely. That's not as common as we would hope as defense lawyers. They usually do their job. But maybe you weren't driving. Maybe you were sleeping in a in a parking lot. Maybe maybe you pulled off the road because you weren't feeling great. Maybe you're struggling with housing and and you're in college and you were drinking in your car. Well, Arizona does not officially have a bright line rule to say it's DUI if the keys are in the front of the car. It's not if they're in the trunk or it's DUI if the car is on. It's not if it's off. Arizona has a series of factors that have been developed through the case law designed to establish whether or not you posed an immediate threat of driving. And those factors include common sense things. Was the car on? Were the keys in the ignition? Uh was the car in drive? Were the lights on? and any other factors that that law enforcement might reasonably believe led to them thinking that you were about to drive. [snorts] And so you sort of on the one end of this spectrum, we have people who who are um you know pulling off the road, they've been off the road for 6 hours. Um the car is in park, the lights are off, and there is evidence that they're waiting for a ride uh in their phone that was provided to police. Well, that person is probably not in what we would call actual physical control. That that person is not really posing an immediate threat of driving. What about somebody who on the other end of the spectrum falls asleep at a red light, car in drive, lights on, luckily foot on the brake, police have to surround them, park in front, park in back, go knock, knock. This is very common, by the way. Wake up the individual. They freak out. They might even press the gas a little bit. Okay, that person is almost certainly in actual physical control. So, this is a jury question that we get to establish uh through evidence and and and the state needs to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that in fact that person was about to drive. The next thing we want to know is uh were they drunk? Now, drunk's not a legal term. So, we're going to say were they either above the limit of 008 or impaired to the slightest degree. So, the limit in Arizona is 0.08. And it's not simply that there was a reading above a 0.08. It's that your actual blood alcohol at a certain point in time was above a 008. And there are margins of error. And they use scientific data. And we analyze that data with our experts to determine if they can really prove this. Can they get this evidence in and can they prove it? Another way they can get that first regular DUI and prove that drunk element is by being impaired to the slightest degree. So, all of those roadside tests that you see when you see somebody walking the line or finger to nose or holding one foot in the air, um those are those are evidence not only collected to establish whether or not they should place somebody under arrest, but to then use at their trial to prove ::Truncated::