Evidence in Montgomery County DUID Cases
If you are pulled over by law enforcement and suspected of being under the influence of drugs, the following is information on the evidence law enforcement will be looking for and how they are likely to collect this evidence. To learn more, call and schedule a consultation with a Montgomery County Drug DUI lawyer today.
How Police Look For Evidence of Drug Use During DUI Stop
The first thing the officer is going to look at is driving behavior. If an individual is having a lot of difficulty maintaining a single lane, or if they’re driving without their headlights on when it’s dark out—those types of driving behavior are potentially indicative of impairment. An officer is going to make note of those when conducting a traffic stop as a potential sign of impairment.
The next thing the officer is going to look at is the demeanor. He or she will consider elements like:
- How did the individual retrieve documents?
- How did the individual answer questions?
- What did the individual’s eyes look like?
- Was the smell of drugs or alcohol present in the vehicle or on the driver?
Officers are trained to notice whether an individual’s eyes are bloodshot or glassy or watery, and those are all going to be listed as potential indicators of impairment.
Finally, an officer is going to be asking verbal questions, such as:
- “Where are you coming from, and what were you doing there?
- “Were you using drugs?”
- “Are any drugs or alcohol present in the vehicle?”
- “Are you on any medication?”
The way an individual chooses to answer those questions is going to go a long way towards the officer’s determination of probable cause to continue the investigation, which can possibly be extended into a DUI investigation.
Use of Field Sobriety Tests In Drug-Related DUI Stops
Officers use field sobriety tests for both alcohol-related and drug-related DUI stops. The issue isn’t so much what a driver may be impaired by as whether or not he or she is indeed driving while impaired or driving under the influence.
When an officer asks an individual to step out of the car and conduct field sobriety tests, most officers at that point aren’t 100% whether they’re look at a drug DUI, or an alcohol DUI, or some combination of both, and so they will conduct the same procedure regardless what type of DUI they suspect.
First, the officer will ask the individual to step out of the car. Then, they will ask him or her to conduct standardized field sobriety tests promulgated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
It is only after the arrest that the difference between an alcohol DUI and a drug DUI come into effect. Specifically for an alcohol DUI, the officer is going to take an individual back to the police station and ask them to blow into a breathalyzer test. For a drug DUI, the officer will normally ask that individual to then conduct a further interview with a drug recognition evaluator (DRE). At the conclusion of that interview, the DRE officer may ask the individual to submit to a blood test. As you can see, it really isn’t in the initial arrest phase of the case that there’s a lot of difference between drug and alcohol DUIs—the differences arise only after an individual is arrested.
Blood Tests in Montgomery County
Whether you choose to refuse a breathalyzer test or a blood test, the penalties for a refusal are going to be exactly the same. The Motor Vehicle Administration will suspend a person’s driver’s license exactly the same for refusing to cooperate with a completion of a blood draw as they would for refusing to cooperate with a completion of a breath test.
Additionally, the paperwork is exactly the same, the only difference is there’s a special section where the DRE evaluator needs to list their probable cause to ask the individual to take the blood test.
How is The Process Different For a Blood Test Than a Breathalyzer?
Process-wise, it’s also exactly the same. There is a difference, however, between alcohol and drug DUI cases once the test is completed. The Motor Vehicle Administration will suspend an individual’s driver’s license if they have an alcohol concentration of a 0.08 or higher, but there is no equivalent drug limit that causes an automatic license suspension. Even if an individual’s test comes back positive for some type of drug, there’s no automatic administrative suspension like there would be in a DUI alcohol case.
There are, however, potential penalties for a drug test coming back positive. Specifically, it makes it significantly easier for the state to get a conviction in court, but there is no administrative penalty against the driver’s license for submitting a positive drug test.