What NOT to Do After Being Arrested for a DUI

When somebody is stopped for a vehicle code violation or possibly under the suspicion of driving under the influence, they do not want to make any admissions or statements that could be used against them. When somebody is stopped and questioned about driving under the influence, just about every question that a police officer asks is intended to incriminate the suspect. Now, people may not realize this when they are first contacted. An officer may just appear to be making friendly conversation, but every question has a particular purpose and that is to incriminate them.

If an officer asks even for very simple material such as a driver’s license, registration, proof of insurance, they are in the process of conducting a DUI investigation. Additionally, if somebody were to be questioned about where they were coming from or where they were going, somebody may think that an officer is just asking a nice question, but in reality, the officer is gathering information for a DUI prosecution. Officers may ask about what the person has had to drink. Of course, that’s directly related to the prosecution of a DUI and an officer may also ask how much sleep somebody had gotten and whether or not the person is under a doctor’s care, and these are all questions that will ultimately be used in the prosecution of the DUI case.

The people that are pulled over are trying to show that sleep deprivation or medical treatment is not involved with the impairing effects of alcohol, and any questions that an officer asks during a traffic stop are geared towards proving or disproving a certain aspect of a DUI criminal case. So, it’s very important that if somebody is stopped for any vehicle code violation, that they not give any answers or extra information to a police officer. What someone wants to do if they are stopped is to hand over their driver’s license and their proof of insurance and not answer any questions and just invoke their right to remain silent and keep it very simple and not answer a lot of questions.

When possibly being investigated for driving under the influence, you don’t want to get anxious or angry or upset or jump to any conclusions. You want to keep everything as simple and polite as possible. You want to be unmemorable; you don’t know what the officer is going to do in a particular situation. The officer may or may not have probable cause to make a lawful arrest, and you don’t want to give any additional information, but you also don’t want to antagonize or alienate the officer. You want to keep it as pleasant and short as possible and realize that whatever is going to happen is going to happen and you will deal with it, and you will fix what can be fixed at a later time. Out on the side of the road in the middle of the night is not the time or the place to try to fix the officer’s impressions or interpretations.

Police officers are trained very well in how to interact with people out on the streets. You’ve all heard the saying about good cop, bad cop and how partners may take different points of view. It’s actually true, and we actually see time and time again where there is a good cop, bad cop routine; one cop will be more aggressive and the other will be the good cop who says, “I’m going to help you out. Just answer these questions. I think you’re okay.” They will possibly lie to people and, of course, there are not going to be any repercussions for the officer for lying, but if somebody being stopped and detained lies, then there are criminal charges that could be brought against them. That’s why someone should exercise their right to remain silent, not give incorrect information, not lie or misrepresent and not give any truthful answers either because that would be used against you as well.

So, the best thing to do is just to remain silent, but officers will often pick a personality type and either try to be aggressive and domineering to get the information they want, or they will appear to be passive and very friendly, hoping you will think, “Hey, if I work with this cop and I’m honest and I tell the cop what happened and what I really had to drink and where the drugs are that they are going to be helpful to me or go easy on me.” The truth is that the officers are doing their job, they are out there to do investigations, to make arrests and to take people possibly driving under the influence off the road; being nice and friendly usually does not get you any preferential treatment in the criminal justice system. Now, if somebody is hostile and agitated and aggressive against the police officers, things will get worse, so we definitely don’t want to go the other way.

Many times, when we are dealing with a driving under the influence stop and detention, the person suspected of driving under the influence may be very close to their home, within a couple of blocks many times, and it’s very easy for people to say, “Hey, please let me go. I am a couple of blocks away. We can just leave the car here if you are concerned about it.” Those statements become admissions that you know that you are impaired and that’s why you are offering to leave the car or, at worst, it could be viewed as trying to bribe an officer that if they let you go, you will do something in return. So, we have to be very careful not to make any statements.

Once we get into the court proceedings and somebody is in the court room facing a judge and a prosecutor, they may feel like they should ask for mercy and plead guilty. They are not going to get mercy; they are not going to get any leniency by throwing themselves on the mercy of the court. Judges and prosecutors just don’t have that in them for DUI cases. It’s not a situation where somebody is charged with a criminal offense for the first time and they need to be cut a break. Most people charged with driving under the influence are facing criminal charges for the first time in their lives and everybody is in the same boat.

Many times, the judges and prosecutors who handle DUIs will handle dozens, if not hundreds, of DUIs every day, which means they have become desensitized and hardened to it and don’t care about what the consequences are. They are looking at getting cases closed and resolved and off their books and they don’t cut any deals or reduce any charges just because somebody is throwing themselves on the mercy of the court. A lot of times things are actually worse for somebody who does that because they don’t know what possible defenses or mitigating factors may be available to them, and the state law also imposes certain mandatory penalties.

Even if a judge wanted to give somebody a break or reduce the charge, state law prevents a judge from doing that. It has to be done through negotiations with the prosecutor. Judges will just dole out the mandatory penalties for a DUI and often whatever the prosecutor is asking for; the judge makes the determination based on what is believed to be appropriate given the particular facts of the case…if the judge knows the facts of the case. Many times judges don’t know the case’s facts, and anything that somebody says in court, once again, can be used against them as an incriminating statement and oftentimes will.

So, the best thing to do is not to walk in to court on your own and throw yourself on the mercy of the court because it just doesn’t happen; you just don’t get mercy. You will be convicted and punished and hopefully sent home but maybe sent to jail, depending on the particular charges that you’re facing. The best thing to do when facing criminal charges is to retain an attorney to represent you in court and at the DMV and to let the attorney properly advise you on the best course of action for your particular case.

You do not want to try and represent yourself on a DUI case in Los Angeles County. It is very complicated to get through the criminal justice system on a regular criminal matter, and a DUI is heavily involved with science and law and police procedure as well. It is very bad advice to try to handle a criminal case on your own. The law allows or provides that everybody has a right to an attorney; it is a constitutional right to have an attorney represents you. You can hire a private attorney who should devote the needed time to your case and often is more experienced than a public defender. However, if you can’t afford a private attorney, then the court will appoint one, typically a public defender, to represent you and that is better than representing yourself in court.

If you try to represent yourself, it is such a bad idea that a judge may not let you do it. In Los Angeles County if a judge does let you represent yourself, you will be required to fill out a four-page form that lists all of the potential pitfalls and problems with self-representation and what will happen to you if you represent yourself. People who try to represent themselves after maybe doing some research on the internet don’t know what the issues are and what the legal proceedings or objections could be to a particular case. Many times, people trying to represent themselves just cause more trouble for themselves. People get into worse trouble than if they had a public defender or private attorney representing them.

The judge will require you to go over the four-page waiver form and initial and sign it, acknowledging how bad an idea it is to represent yourself and how you will be treated as if you have an attorney. So if you are without an attorney, you won’t know what you’re missing and you don’t know what you don’t know and what evidence could be excluded, what objections could be made, what motions could be brought. You will be held to the same standard when you’re representing yourself as if you had an attorney. So, it is a very bad idea to go to court alone. If you can afford a private attorney, that is going to give you the highest likelihood of success. As long as you do your homework and get a good attorney, that’s going to get you the best possible result and save you the most headaches and minimize the punishment that you’re facing on a DUI case.

When hiring an attorney, there are a lot of things to consider and it’s very difficult to know how to pick the best one. It’s like trying to pick a doctor or a dentist. You don’t know exactly what’s going on inside and you need to use certain clues to make sure that you’re getting the right one. Getting a personal referral is a fantastic way to find a good DUI defense attorney. If a friend or a family member has used that attorney and they have been successful and they have had good communication with them, that’s a real plus. Price alone is not necessarily a good judge of what you are going to get. There are some attorneys who charge a lot of money and don’t necessarily do the work needed to get the best possible result for somebody.

But on the other hand, you can use a low price as a filter because if somebody is charging an unusually low price to represent someone on a DUI, that’s going to tell you where that person’s motivation is. If somebody is charging a very low price, they either don’t have the experience and knowledge to handle a DUI case correctly, or if they do have years of experience and knowledge regarding DUIs, they are not going to put them to use, and they are not going to spend the time on your case necessary to get the result that you deserve. So, high prices are something that needs to be looked into, but with low prices, you can pretty much categorically exclude that attorney.

How much an attorney is going to charge is going to depend on how complex the case is, what their experience is, and what their results are, and it’s going to be a case-by-case basis. But when looking to choose an attorney, first try to find a personal referral and if you can’t do that because these are private matters you don’t want to talk to other people about, you can look to referral sites online and try to gather information from others’ experiences. You can go to attorney review sites like AVVO.com, Yelp, or other sites that will have reviews and critiques of attorneys. You will also want to review that particular attorney’s resume.

Price alone doesn’t tell you what courses they have taken and what their success has been in the past. So, do your homework and don’t make a decision simply based on the price to make sure that you get the very best possible attorney to represent you.

Being charged with a criminal offense such as a DUI is a very stressful situation. You do want to move relatively quickly to find a good DUI defense attorney to help you because there are timelines involved, and there is also peace of mind that comes with getting a good attorney. But a good attorney is not going to be a high pressure salesperson. It’s not going to be a salesperson at all. It’s going to be an attorney who can talk to you about the case, can answer your questions and let you know what timelines you need to be aware of and when certain decisions need to be made. If somebody is trying to get you to sign a retainer without you having an opportunity to do your homework, that’s a clue that this isn’t the best attorney for you.

You want somebody who is going to be compassionate, understanding, knowledgeable and patient. Attorneys may have handled hundreds or thousands of DUI charges over years and years of time, but for an individual who is charged, it’s usually a first-time offense and everything is new. That attorney needs to be able to slow down and spend the time with the person and let them make the right decision for themselves. So, if somebody is trying to get you to sign and is putting a lot of pressure on you or possibly using scare tactics, you want to take a step back and not make that decision right then and there. Just like hiring any other kind of professional, you want to make sure that you do your homework and talk to a few to know what qualifications they should have, what experience they should have and what a fair price is going to be for the work that’s going to be done.

If you were to hire a contractor to work on your house, you probably would want to talk to a few different contractors. If you were going to go to a doctor for a special surgery, you’d want to get a second opinion and talk to a couple of different doctors. The same goes for an attorney. Talk to a couple of different attorneys to make sure you get one that has the experience and the qualification, someone who will fight for you, someone who wants to get you the best possible result for your case and will be able to work with you over the period of time that you have your case pending.

It’s a bad idea to drive if your license is suspended. Many times, people will get a suspended license because of a DUI or because of too many points on their record or for some other reason. If you get caught driving on a suspended license or driving on a restricted license outside of the restricted use, you are facing additional criminal charges and potentially administrative charges as well. So, you definitely do not want to put yourself in a position where you’ll get caught driving on a suspended license. You’re facing not only possible jail time, but mandatory jail time in many cases. This just aggravates the situation, making the existing case more difficult, and it brings another case with more potential jail time, so you do not want to drive without a valid license and insurance at any time.

Any time somebody is facing allegations of driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, they want to make sure to avoid any potentially sticky situations. They should not drive with any alcohol in their system or drive without a valid license, and they also want to make sure not to put themselves in any position where they could potentially be involved in any alcohol or a drug related activity. This means not going to any underground parties or any open outside events where they could come into contact with law enforcement while having alcohol in their system.

If somebody is charged with a driving under the influence, they are going to be issued a citation, which will have a court date on it. Oftentimes they will have been required to sign that citation and that signature is a promise to appear. If they don’t go to court on that date, not only could additional charges like a failure to appear be added to the particular case, but a judge could issue a warrant for their arrest, so the very first appearance is important, but any time the judge orders a person back on a particular date, that’s a continuing court order and if they violate that order, they will be facing additional charges.

A judge could issue a warrant for your arrest, which means the sheriff’s department could come to your house or your work and actually pick you up and arrest you, and then forcibly take you to court. So, any time that you’re given a court date, you need to discuss it with your attorney and, many times, your attorney can go for you, but that’s something you need to clear with your attorney. If you do miss any dates, you are looking at a warrant and potentially a new charge and jail time.

Many times in a DUI investigation, the police officers will do a lot of questioning without advising people of their right to remain silent and the DUI laws kind of create an exception to the Miranda requirement. Miranda requires that a person be advised of their right to remain silent and the right to an attorney if they have been arrested and they are in custody and they are interrogated or questioned, but because a DUI investigation is not a formal arrest, at least at the beginning, Miranda does not apply until the person is in custody. All of the questions that police officers ask out by the side of the road when the person is in the car or just out of the car fall outside the Miranda requirements.

Once the person is arrested, the police officers really don’t have any more questions for them. They have already completed their investigation, done all the work that they need to do and gotten all the information and answers they need. The only thing left to do after the person has been arrested is for the person to submit to a chemical test – a breath or a blood test – and the person, according to implied consent laws, has to do those tests and they do not have a right to an attorney at that point because the chemical testing is not really considered questioning, so Miranda does not apply for that and there are no further questions for the officers to ask. They have gathered all their information through pre-field sobriety test questions and field sobriety tests and the case is pretty much completed.

If somebody was not advised of their Miranda rights, it may not really affect the case at all. Sometimes, it may. It’s going to depend on the particular circumstances, but in most DUI cases, Miranda does not become a big issue. Sometimes, officers will advise about Miranda rights at the beginning of an investigation and there is no downside. It doesn’t hurt for the officers to do that except that people may actually consider the information and remain silent; that would impair the officer’s ability to do a thorough investigation, but most of the time they don’t advise the Miranda and it does not become a huge issue in the case.

Whenever somebody is facing a criminal charge, whether that’s driving under the influence or any other charge, we want them not to discuss the matter with anyone, whether it’s somebody who is in custody and could be talking to a jailhouse snitch or whether it’s somebody who is out of custody and wants to talk to insurance adjusters or friends about what’s going on. Anybody who someone talks to is a potential witness to what that person said and could be subpoenaed and brought into court by a prosecutor to testify against the person.

You have the right to talk to your attorney, and the conversations you have with your attorney and your attorney’s staff are confidential and privileged attorney work-product conversations. If you need to talk to somebody about the case, your attorney is the person to talk to. You don’t even want to talk to your own family about what’s going on, because they could be subpoenaed and forced to testify about what you said even if they don’t want to. You have the right to remain silent and that’s what you want to do. You don’t want to talk about it to anybody, you don’t want to spread the information around and you want to limit any exposure you have. You definitely do not want to go on any social media like Facebook or Twitter and post any comments about your arrest or the investigation.

It’s very important that you have a good working relationship with your attorney and that you answer all of your attorney’s questions completely, honestly and in good detail. Your statements to your attorney are attorney-client privilege statements; your attorney does not disclose that information to anybody and your attorney will not try to use that information against you. But your attorney does need as much information as possible to make sure that they make the right decisions in how to proceed in defending your case. Just because you don’t want something to come out and your attorney doesn’t know about it doesn’t mean that the prosecutor doesn’t know about it or the judge doesn’t know about it or the cops don’t know about it.

So, it does happen that somebody will have prior allegations, whether they are prior DUIs or other potential criminal conduct, and a client just chooses not to share that information with their attorney and then, when we get to court, that information comes out and it makes the present case worse. For example, if somebody has a prior DUI and they don’t tell their attorney about it, their attorney doesn’t have the opportunity to investigate or prepare for dealing with that information. Somebody can be taken into custody, arrested in court or have a warrant issued for their arrest because of additional information that their attorney didn’t know about. If there are any other allegations, potential charges, suspended license, or DUIs, all of that needs to be disclosed to your attorney in order for them to be able to do the best job in protecting you.

DUI cases are very fact specific and every DUI case is unique. You may talk to people, who have been charged with a DUI, because many people are, and they may have gotten a certain result, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you will get the same result; your result may be better, worse or you may end up with the same, depending on the facts of your particular case. There are a lot of factors that influence DUI cases. There is state law, there is scientific evidence, there are local court procedures. Even the same case in two different courtrooms in the same courthouse can turn out to have different results.

It just depends on who the prosecutors are, who the judges are, who the attorneys are, and many other different factors that come into play. There are some cases that will be filed by a city attorney prosecutor in one courthouse that would be rejected and never even get filed if it was a district attorney in another courthouse. Every case is different, every investigating officer is different, and how an investigation is done can vary from police officer to police officer. So, just because someone has the same chemical test result doesn’t mean that they are going to get the same result in court. If there are aggravating factors or mitigating factors, that all needs to be taken into consideration. It’s important to get as much information as you can and work with your attorney to get the very best possible result. There are many factors that need to be taken into consideration when deciding how to resolve or settle a DUI case.

If somebody is convicted of driving under the influence in Los Angeles County, they are going to be required to comply with certain terms of probation. There are certain mandatory state laws as well as certain countywide requirements for somebody who is convicted of driving under the influence. So, whether it’s by a jury or by a plea bargain, if somebody has a term of probation where they are required to do certain things, it’s important that they do them, because if they don’t do what they are required to, they are looking at a potential probation violation, which could land somebody back in jail. If somebody is given as a term of probation that they not drive with any alcohol in their system and they then get caught driving with alcohol in their system, they are looking at a potential probation violation in court and possible jail time.

They are also looking at potential Department of Motor Vehicles consequences. If somebody is required to do an alcohol program and they fail to complete the alcohol program, it’s a potential probation violation, which means they are looking at potential jail time as well as license suspension. Every obligation that someone has needs to be viewed as an order from the court because it is and if they don’t do it, then they are looking at possible penalties up to the maximum allowed on that particular charge. So, for a first-time DUI, someone can get up to six months in county jail and if it’s a second-time DUI, it’s up to a year.

If somebody is charged with driving under the influence in Los Angeles, they may think that since they had something to drink or did some drugs, they are guilty and that there is nothing that can be done. That’s simply not true! Driving under the influence is not like other types of alleged crimes. If somebody is charged with stealing something, then they either took it or they didn’t take it, but driving under the influence isn’t like that. It’s much more of a grey area because it is legal to drive after you’ve had something to drink; the question is about whether you are impaired for purposes of driving. That can be argued and negotiated with the prosecutor. It may be a matter of the degree of impairment.

But even if somebody did have too much to drink, there are different cutoffs and different enhancements that can affect what type of sentence somebody is looking at. It’s important that people continue to fight to protect themselves and minimize their exposure because they may not have been impaired for purposes of driving, and if they were impaired there are different thresholds that need to be taken into consideration. Even if somebody is impaired above certain cutoff points, it doesn’t mean that the investigation was done correctly or the equipment was working properly or that there aren’t other legal or scientific issues that need to be addressed. It’s not simply a matter of somebody did or didn’t do it; it may be a matter of whether or not it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

There are a lot of different factors that a person needs to get help with if they are charged with a crime. If someone were sick, if they had an illness or a disease, even if it were a serious disease that may be life threatening, that person still wants to get help from a doctor. They want to get medical treatment and they want to do everything they can to survive and have the best possible outcome. It’s the same thing with someone charged with driving under the influence. You may have a very serious situation, but you want to make sure you do everything you can to get the very best possible outcome, and the first step in doing that is finding the right attorney.