A Dismissal and Not Guilty Verdict After a Two- Day DUI by Drugs Trial

After a two-day trial in the District Court of Maryland for Harford County located in Bel Air, Maryland, JPB Law, LLC’s DUI Attorney secured a Dismissal and a Not Guilty Verdict on two DUI charges against our client.

Most people do not expect to be detained, arrested, charged and prosecuted for DUI despite being fully cooperative and forthcoming with law enforcement, not displaying any signs of slurred speech or an odor of alcohol, performing standardized field sobriety tests, blowing a .00 blood alcohol concentration and voluntarily submitting to a blood test that returned a result of “NONE DETECTED”. Unfortunately, this was the reality (or nightmare) for one client of JPB Law, LLC.

JPB Law, LLC’s client was driving home from work on a Friday evening around 11:45 p.m., after an 11-hour shift, when the flashing lights appeared in her rearview. She immediately pulled over in a safe manner with her right blinker on and had her driver’s license ready for the approaching law enforcement officer. The officer, admittedly, approached our client’s vehicle with a preconceived notion that the operator of the vehicle was significantly intoxicated before he even stepped out of his police cruiser to approach our client’s vehicle for the first time.

Despite our client answering all the officer’s questions and dispelling any concern that she was impaired, the officer demanded that our client step out of her vehicle for further investigation because of her traffic infractions and allegedly “bloodshot eyes” and “constricted pupils”. On the side of a dark road, on an uneven surface, at almost midnight, after being awake for almost 18 hours, JPB Law LLC’s client performed standardized field sobriety tests to the best of her ability.

Upon completion of the standardized field sobriety tests, our client, to her dismay, was arrested, placed in handcuffs, her car was towed, and she was transported to a precinct for even further investigation. Our client continued to cooperate fully with law enforcement. She submitted to the breathalyzer test (again, the result was .00), she submitted to an evaluation by a Drug Recognition Expert, and she voluntarily submitted to a blood test for drugs (again, the result was “NONE DETECTED”).

Notwithstanding the foregoing, the State forged ahead and proceeded to prosecute our client for DUI.

At trial, the State’s theory was that our client was so far impaired by an unspecified combination of drugs that she could not safely operate a motor vehicle. The State called three witnesses: (1) the arresting officer; (2) the Drug Recognition Expert; and (3) a chemist from the Maryland State Police laboratory.

JPB Law, LLC’s DUI Attorney conducted thorough cross-examinations of each of the State’s witnesses, including, but not limited to, highlighting flaws and inaccuracies in law enforcement’s reports, playing body worn camera footage from the night of the incident on the side of the road and back at the precinct, and otherwise painting the picture for the Court that the State was “trying to fit a square peg into a round hole”.

In the end, the Court dismissed one DUI charge, and found JPB Law, LLC’s client Not Guilty of the other DUI charge.