March 2010 - Posts

• “Dial-a-Drunk”: How to Get Back at That Guy Tailgating You

  It has become an increasingly common practice for police to receive anonymous phone calls about “drunk drivers” on the road. These “tips” are typically relayed by the police dispatcher to an officer in the field as a call to investigate a “suspected drunk driver”; the officer is rarely told that the [...] Posted Mar 29 2010, 06:54 AM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Why is Drunk Driving Illegal?

  As a former law professor, I would start my criminal law courses with the basics: There are two kinds of laws: malum in se and malum prohibitum.  With the first, a law exists because the prohibited conduct is inherently bad; murder, theft and rape would be obvious examples.  With the second, the conduct is illegal [...] Posted Mar 22 2010, 04:55 PM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Feds Threaten Nebraska if DUI Law Not Changed

  As everyone knows, each state has the right to enact DUI laws it feels appropriate for its citizens. The federal government has no authority to dictate to the state legislatures what those laws should be.  That’s the theory. The reality is that federal bureaucrats routinely coerce states by threatening to withhold badly-needed federal funds.  And this [...] Posted Mar 13 2010, 11:36 AM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Don’t Drink (Coffee) and Drive

  Ok, you’ve had two glasses of wine with dinner and it’s time to head home. You feel fine, but throw down a couple of cups of coffee to clear your head just to be sure. Then you pay the bill, walk out to your car, get behind the wheel — and one [...] Posted Mar 10 2010, 01:12 PM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Whatever Happened to “Drunk Driving”?

  Drunk driving is bad.  It’s potentially dangerous to human life.  It should be punished.  So, many years ago a law was passed:  "Thou shalt not drive drunk". It was a fair law and it addressed the problem.  So…what happened?  Why do today’s laws punish drivers when they are neither "drunk" nor "driving" — nor even in a [...] Posted Mar 05 2010, 10:01 AM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Test Post

  Test Posted Mar 02 2010, 05:53 PM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog

• Drunk Driving Laws Trump Science Again

  It is an unfortunate fact that law and politics repeatedly trump science when it comes to prosecuting citizens accused of drunk driving….. In People v. Bransford, to cite one notable example, the California Supreme Court was confronted with a defendant who was challenging his DUI conviction on the grounds that he was [...] Posted Mar 02 2010, 05:05 PM by DUI BLOG Filed under: Duiblog