Free DUI Lawyer In California

Reader’s Question:

A friend of mine got arrested in Los Angeles, California because of DUI. He had a slurred speech according to the police report. Can a slurred speech be used as evidence in a DUI trial?

Alonzo

Los Angeles, CA

Just like the odor of alcohol on the breath of a person arrested for DUI, a very few police reports would fail to include an observation by the police officer that the person arrested exhibited “slurred speech” during the DUI arrest. The police officer usually expects to hear slurred speech in a person whom he/she suspects as intoxicated or driving under the influence, particularly after smelling alcohol on the breath. Also, it would be a psychological fact that we tend to “hear” what we expect to hear. And upon hearing a slurred speech, it supplies the police officer with a proof of his suspicions that the person was indeed intoxicated, and thus driving under the influence.

Assuming that the police officer was honest that your friend who was arrested for DUI in Los Angeles, California had a slurred speech during the DUI arrest, there is little evidence that this is a symptom of intoxication. For example, impairment of speech, even when sober, is a common reaction to the stress, fear and nervousness that a police investigation would be expected to happen. Fatigue is also a well-known cause of having a slurred speech. A study of phonetician showed that even self-proclaimed experts are not good at estimating people’s alcohol levels by the way they talk.

Reader’s Question:

I did a little research about alcohol because my daughter has been arrested for DUI here in Buena Park, California. One of the reasons my daughter was asked to do the field sobriety tests is because the officer said that he smelled strong odor of alcohol on my daughter’s breath. I found out that alcohol really does not have an odor, so could she use this as a defense on her DUI case?

Piper

Buena Park, CA

Yes, your daughter can definitely use that as a defense on her DUI case in Buena Park, California. I bet you can never see a DUI case where the police officer doesn’t report an odor of alcohol on the DUI suspect’s breath. The officer actually expects to smell it and it is a psychological fact that we see, hear and smell what we expect to see, hear and smell. As a matter of fact, most DUI police reports are formatted for the usual symptoms: there would be a box for “odor of alcohol”, which the officer checks off. There are three boxes labelled as “strong”, “moderate” and “weak.” The “strong” box is usually checked because presumably, the stronger the odor of alcohol, the more intoxicated the person arrested; and the problem with that is alcohol has no odor. Even a non-alcoholic drink can smell like the “odor of alcohol,” when in fact, what the officer smells is not ethyl alcohol but the flavoring in the beverage.

And, of course, there could be a number of causes of an “odor of alcohol” on a person’s breath such as mouth wash, throat spray and cough syrup. Indigestion, illness or simple bad breath has been the cause of more than one officer’s trigger-quick conclusion that the suspect has an “odor of alcohol on his breath.” The main point is that the odor of alcohol has very little relevance in a DUI case. It could or could not indicate that the person has consumed alcohol. It has no evidentiary value as to how much the person has consumed, what he had to drink and when.