Changes in alcohol testing lowers DWI arrests
As some drivers are finding out at drunken driving checkpoints and traffic stops every week, Greene County has a new policy.
If you say no to a breath test, authorities can go straight to the source to learn your blood alcohol content — your blood.
Even if that means strapping you to a chair.
When prosecutors and law enforcement agencies adopted the blood-draw policy in November, they hoped it would eventually become a deterrent and cause people to think twice before driving drunk.
And they say the early returns are positive.
Springfield police and the Greene County Sheriff's Office are both reporting fewer DWI arrests and fewer people refusing breathalyzers over the first six months of the new policy compared to the same time frame last year.
Officials say there appear to be fewer drunken drivers on the road in Greene County, and one factor could be the message sent by this new policy: there's no way to avoid testing anymore.
But not everyone is a fan.
Springfield defense attorney Adam Woody said the policy is only slowing down the already lethargic criminal justice system.
Woody said some of his clients who had their blood drawn when the policy first started in November still haven't gotten their results back yet. That means an extra six months in limbo before charges are even filed — or not filed.
Woody said he has also seen the new policy actually help a couple of buzzed drivers get off the hook over the last few months because by the time blood was drawn, they were under the .08 percent limit at which drunkenness is presumed in an adult.
Last year in Greene County, three people were killed and another 128 were seriously injured in crashes involving impaired drivers. Those numbers obviously bother local authorities.
Officials with the police department, sheriff's office, Missouri State Highway Patrol and county prosecutor's office sat down last fall and decided to try the blood-draw policy on a pilot basis with the goal of making DWI cases easier to prosecute and deterring drunken driving.
The way it works, when someone is suspected of driving drunk and refuses a breathalyzer test, police can ask prosecutors for a warrant to draw a vial of his or her blood. If a judge signs off on the warrant, then medical staff at the jail or hospital will draw blood from the suspect and send it to the crime lab to be tested.
"It was a mutual goal to be tough on DWIs and ensure that we have the best case going forward for prosecution," Greene County Sheriff Jim Arnott said. "We are hoping that there is a deterrent there and they understand that drunk driving isn't tolerated in Greene County."
From Dec. 1 to March 31, Greene County deputies made 27 fewer DWI arrests and had 41 fewer people refuse breathalyzer tests compared to the same time frame last year.
The difference is more drastic for Springfield police who made 92 fewer DWI arrests and had 69 fewer refusals.
"I think it adds another tool in our belt as far as showing the community we are serious about DWI enforcement and we really want to make a difference in the number of impaired drivers," said Capt. David Johnson with the Greene County Sheriff's Office.
Maj. Kirk Manlove with the police department said DWI-related crashes in the city are also trending downward.
Manlove said there are a number of factors that could contribute to the apparent drop in drunken driving, such as public awareness campaigns, continued enforcement and aggressive prosecution of DWI offenses. He believes it is too early to say if the blood-draw policy, also known as no-refusal, is playing a role.
Assistant State's Attorney Jennifer Cifaldi started a blood-draw program in Adams County, Illinois, about eight years ago, after the county's drunken driving arrests reached almost 500 in a year.
In 2014, drunken driving arrests in Adams County were down to 174, and Cifaldi credited the blood-draw policy.
She said drawing blood in a DWI case doesn't seem all that odd when you think of it in the context of any other criminal investigation.
"Why are we allowing the defendants to dictate what evidence is collected at the crime scene?" Cifaldi said. "If you look at it from that premise, it makes sense. We want to get all of the evidence."
Some states and other Missouri counties — including nearby Christian County — have been drawing blood in DWI investigations for some time. However, Greene County waited until a ruling in a Missouri case in which a blood draw was challenged.
That ruling came in a U.S. Supreme Court case about a Missouri man, Tyler McNeely, who had his blood drawn without a warrant after refusing a breathalyzer during a 2010 traffic stop.
The court ruled in April 2013 that it is generally unconstitutional to draw someone's blood without a warrant, but OK to do so after obtaining a search warrant.
The backlog at the Missouri Highway Patrol Crime Laboratory in Springfield has been well-documented.
Springfield police have said delays at the crime lab are why they have yet to present evidence to prosecutors for February's high profile officer-involved shooting.
Officials in Texas, where DWI no-refusal is prevalent, have argued that the blood draws are causing delays at crime labs.
But Missouri Highway Patrol crime lab director Bill Marbaker said DWI blood tests aren't to blame for the backlog in Springfield.
"We have had a slight increase, but it's not impactful," Marbaker said. "We have a very high capacity for those kinds of tests. We are able to manage it quite well without any detrimental impact."
Woody, the defense attorney, said dozens of his clients have run into the no-refusal blood draws so far.
In a couple of those cases, Woody said his clients' blood alcohol content came back below 0.08 percent — effectively ruining the prosecution's case. In one of those cases, the defendant's blood alcohol content came back as 0.076 percent.
Woody said in some of his other cases, clients had their blood drawn in November and still haven't gotten the results back yet. He said that puts his clients in tough spots emotionally with the potential case hanging over their heads for half a year.
The statute of limitations to charge someone in a DWI case is one year after the arrest.
Woody said the blood-draw policy is also leading to some changes for driver's license suspensions.
Woody said before the new policy, refusing a breathalyzer would result in a one-year license suspension and then another suspension if you were convicted in a criminal case.
Under the new policy, Woody said there is an additional 90-day administrative license suspension the Department of Revenue can impose if your blood results show a blood alcohol content of 0.08 percent or above.
Woody said it is tough to give advice without knowing the facts of each individual case, but his general advice for clients — before the new policy — was to refuse the breathalyzer if there was any doubt about passing.
Under the new blood-draw policy, however, Woody said the advice is to go ahead and blow, especially on a first offense.
Woody said there is always a chance the alcohol in someone's blood will dissipate in the time it takes authorities to obtain a search warrant, but that chance is outweighed by the impact that refusing will have on your driver's license.
There is a prosecutor and judge on-call every night to receive, review and sign the warrant information — all electronically. Johnson with the sheriff's office said blood is usually drawn within an hour of when authorities apply for the warrant.
Springfield defense attorney Larry Catt has handled thousands of DWI cases over his career. He said one advantage of the blood draws is that they can be more accurate than a breathalyzer or a field sobriety test because they take into account how a person's body breaks down alcohol.
"Breathalyzers aren't that accurate because they assume certain things about individuals," Catt said. "We aren't the same, but it assumes we are."
Prosecutors also like the accuracy of blood results in DWI cases.
Greene County Prosecutor Dan Patterson said his office gets convictions in most of the DWI cases it tries. But the majority of losses have come when a suspect refused to blow and prosecutors were left without concrete evidence.
Now, prosecutors in Greene County have an avenue to get that evidence, and to all but ensure a conviction.
"We have always taken a very aggressive stance in DWI prosecution," Patterson said. "Even though many of them are misdemeanors, we do take them serious."
Christian County has used the no-refusal policy since 2011, and prosecutor Amy Fite said that while the policy may mean more work for law enforcement on the front end in obtaining the warrants, it can save officers time on the back end if the suspect is presented with the blood evidence and pleads guilty.
"What we have found is that the vast, vast, vast majority of cases come back with a BAC that would be indicative of impairment," Fite said. "For us, that means that we are able to resolve cases with the defendant being held accountable."
District Attorney Warren Diepraam was behind the country's first no-refusal policy in the Houston, Texas area back in 2007.
Diepraam said the refusal rate in his county was about 50 percent and that meant cases typically went to court without either party knowing the defendant's blood alcohol content at the time of arrest.
"I wanted to do something to make sure that we got evidence," Diepraam said. "Evidence of guilt and evidence of innocence."
Diepraam, who now works outside of Houston in nearby Waller County, said refusals have been cut in half in the Houston area. The downside is that now juries expect those blood alcohol content numbers to be there all the time in court cases.
"When prosecutors don't get blood evidence, it makes the case much harder to win," Diepraam said. "Now, the jury expects it."
Diepraam believes that the no-refusal policy is behind a recent drop in DWI fatalities in the Houston area, and that is worth any drawbacks the program may have.
"What makes me proud is that as a prosecutor I know I have saved lives," Diepraam said. "I don't know who those lives are, but I know they're out there."