Building Your Pennsylvania DUI Defense
With serious potential consequences for drunk driving, you want to do everything you can to fight the charges. An experienced lawyer matters to provide you the best possible defense to your case. Even in extremely difficult and challenging cases, an experienced lawyer can minimize the impact on your license, reduce jail time, and advance alternatives to jail. At the Buck County law firm of Attorney Niels C. Eriksen, we know how to explore all your drunk driving defenses in order to build the best possible case, and provide aggressive representation on your behalf.
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Every drunk driving case has a number of potential defenses to examine:
1) The Traffic Stop
Traffic stops are not reliable indicators of drunk driving or probable cause. Many times, especially at night, police will use any reason to stop motorists, such as the failure to use a turn signal or illegally tinted windows. They will even run a computer check to look for expired plates or insurance violations. Police make mistakes. If your initial stop was unconstitutional, your charges could be dropped and the evidence suppressed. An experienced criminal defense lawyer will examine every aspect of the vehicle stop, and protect you from violations of your rights.
2) Initial Drinking and Driving Contact
The police cannot remove you from your vehicle without reasonable suspicion. We will investigate whether the police had a legitimate reason to remove you from your vehicle. Once you are removed, it is important to determine whether field sobriety tests were properly administered. Many officers fail to follow the basic federal standards and perform their own tests without scientific basis.
3) Hire an Investigator
Hiring an investigator on your behalf is an extremely effective tool to challenge a drunk driving case. When there is video of the police contact, it is often favorable to the defense. A good investigator will investigate the location of the stop, whether video evidence exists, possible eye witnesses, and discover evidence the police may ignore or fail to investigate. Do not accept the police investigation, a strong defense begins with a good investigation on your behalf.
4) Portable Breath Tests (PBT)
Portable breath tests are notoriously unreliable, they are not even admissible in court. They are only able to verify that there is some alcohol in a person's system. Do not accept the results of the Portable Breath Tests as evidence that you are guilty. 5) Blood and Breath Tests
Challenging breathalyzer and blood tests is an important part of any DUI defense, because there is an established deviation of up to ten percent based on body type, human error, and other factors. It also important to look at how the tests were obtained in the first place.
Pennsylvania has the three following levels for DUI:
- Level 1: .08 to .099 (General Impairment)
- Level 2: .10 to .159 (High Rate)
- Level 3: .16 or greater (Highest Rate)
If you are just over the limit based on a blood and breath test, it is more appropriate to be charged at the level below. If you are near .08, you should seek a complete dismissal of the case. For your convenience, we provide a blood alcohol content calculator on this site.
Contact Us
Fighting your drunk driving charges means building a comprehensive DUI defense that looks at every aspect of your case. Available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, we are ready to answer your questions. We even make jail visits and bail hearings. Contact us today for a free initial consultation regarding your DUI defense.
