Wow! I did not even know about all that. I may not be as old as your father, but let me give you some 'brotherly' advice: sober the fudge up and start being responsible for what goes on in your life. All I am seeing here is an endless trail of irresponsible behavior, and an equally endless trail of excuses. You are on a path of self-destruction, so sober up before it is too late. Best of luck!
You are probably right but I don't mind the hypocrisy in this case since those hypocrites are sending the right message to readers of this thread.
We are not chastising him for being caught. If you rob a 7-11 and get away with it it does not mean that you are 'A-Okay'
You're right. Many of us have made the mistake of having a few and driving. I too got behind the wheel and thought I was ok.... that was until I made a turn on my street and failed to see a bicyclist, that if I was a couple seconds later, i would have hit. I consider myself very lucky. The difference is he's not recognizing he made a mistake. His solution is not to drink and drive, but to be more careful so he doesn't get pulled over.
I don't think it's gonna get dismissed. You told the cop you had a couple of drinks didn't you and it's in his report? The county makes a hell of alot of money off of these things and they are not just gonna let it go. I got a DWI 9 years ago, and I heard all that stuff from everybody like I could get off and how horrible I was. I hired a lawyer and spent about 5k on the whole deal and still lost. But after I've been thru the system, I don't think there's any chance they're gonna dismiss it. They're gonna offer you the standard deal which is like a years probation, 80 hrs community service, take the DWI classes, and go to a MADD lecture. I also had to see some kind of drug and alcohol counselor to determine if I was a raging alcoholic, or just made a mistake. It's a hard process to go thru and expensive. You need to get yourself a lawyer.
By the way, this is the equivalent of, "I pretty much broke even during my weekend in Vegas." Not calling you a liar, but every cop I know automatically multiplies "a couple of beers" by 4 or 5. "A couple" is the standard answer a person driving under the influence is going to offer.
I got pulled over once for doing four over the limit after drinking exactly two beers. So tell me, what exactly should have I told the cop if "a couple" was going to incriminate me?!?
Good luck man, Here's my experience in California, I drank a few beers at the pool hall, then drove to Norms for a full meal. From the moment I drank till I got pulled over, it's about 2.5 to 3 hours. I was slightly buzzed, passed the field sobriety test, and blew a 0.08 on the scene. After I blew the first time, the cop said he wanted to give me a more accurate reading, so I blew again, and this time its 0.08. Thinking back, I don't know if the cop was lying or not, but i never saw the readings on both times. The cop placed me under arrest and gave the choice of taking the breathalyzer or the blood test, I chose the blood test at a nearby hospital. I got a lawyer for the arraignment. cost 2k. On the day of the arraingnment, I found out that my blood alcohol was 0.07, and that the cop's report was completely contradicting to what I thought, everything about my sobriety test was incriminating. Since its below 0.08, the DA dropped the DUI charge and agreed to a lesser charge of Wet-and-Reckless. At first I thought as long as you're under 0.08, its okay. But actually there are two cases to DUI, the first one is based on 0.08, second one is general DUI, based on the cop's field report. The cop basically lied on the report to make it worse than it was, so I am still stuck with the DUI charge even with a BAC of 0.07. Well, I didnt want to spend another 5K to fight the DUI, so I took the Plea of wet-and-reckless. The good thing was I got my license back right away since its below 0.08. I think your chance of getting everything dismissed is very low unless you have 10K for a good lawyer. I feel your pain man, Bush got a DUI and he was president for 8 freaking years, so don't feel too bad.
So, have you taken a driving test completely sober and another after having two drinks? How do you know it doesn't affect your driving? Perhaps your reaction time is a split second slower after two drinks than it is after no drinks. You don't have to be drunk or over the limit in order to have your driving ability affected.
This. People really don't know how they are impacted by even a few drinks. You may not FEEL like you are impaired, but a lot of times a cop will pull someone over who thought they were fine who just driving over the dummy bumps for about a mile without realizing it. You know when you are drunk and you know when you are very tipsy, but lots of people don't realize when they are just a little slower than normal.
LOL. Yes, and driving those extra 5-10 miles over the speed limit affects things slightly also, but you're not going to see people jailed for it. There are idiot drivers everywhere doing multiple stupid things (speeding, texting, etc.) The DWI thing has become a witch hunt because it's "PC" to do so. All it is in the Governments eyes is a money-grab. I'm of the opinion that if you cause an accident you deserve everything that is currently in place. That said, this issue has gone way too far overboard. If the Government was truly trying to serve the interest of the public good, they would take all of the profits they get from convicted DWI offenders and place it into alternative transportation. So far, they haven't done one lick to improve anything. They just found a nice little cash cow. Metro Bussing stopping at midnight is still the most blatant proof of indifference.
There will always be extreme cases. For every one of the above stories, I can easily find a chronic speeder who eventually caused a fatal car wreck.
I would be over the limit if I drank 3 beers. Well, I don't drink more than 3 beers if I'm driving anyway. I usually drive because I rather to drive instead of my guy. He drinks like 5 beers. I had a bad experience when I was 20. I went out with one of my good friends that time to a club. I told her that it was her turn to be the designated driver and I drank quite too much. I didn't notice that she was inebriated as well when we left. I passed out in the front passenger's seat and I woke up with a jolt. She had rear ended a truck. It's a miracle that we didn't end up going to jail on a DUI charge. The cop told us to call a parent to pick us up so her dad picked us up. Maybe we got lucky because it was a minor accident and the truck didn't suffer damages but her truck did. She had a busted lip because she wasn't wearing a seat belt.I asked her what happened next day and she said she fell asleep. What was more scarier that we were waiting at the light to turn left to get on the freeway. I just don't want to think what would have happened if she fell asleep while driving on the freeway. I was pretty upset. I never trusted a friend to be a designated driver ever again. The only two people I will trust are my sorority sisters and they don't drink. So, don't drink and drive.
Money grabbing is the truth. During booking, questions are asked about your job, pay, rent, mortgage, car payments, etc. Then, a month later, you will take a psychological profile ($20). The gangbangers and the destitute will pass the test and you will not see them again. You, and the gainfully employed, will fail and move on to the next stage of money grabbing.
Something like 40% of all traffic fatalities involve alcohol. Edit: As to whether or not .gov does anything to help, I don't know. I do know that there is a huge difference between someone who drives too fast and someone who is impaired on the road and can't make safe decisions. Accidents can be caused by all sorts of failures to drive properly on the road, but drinking is one where you voluntarily choose to give up your ability to make good decisions on the roadway.
How, exactly, are speeding, talking on phone, texting not voluntary? And there have been several studies showing that talking on a cell phone is just as impairing to the driver as drinking.
I didn't explain myself well. When you speed, text, talk on the phone, etc. what you are doing is unsafe. However, you still have your reflexes in tact and you can still correct the situation if you get put in a spot where a wreck is about to occur. If you are drunk you give up that ability. If you are under the influence but not drunk, you decrease that ability. Again, 40%(or so, don't remember the exact number) of traffic fatalities involve alcohol.
I agree. "couple of beers" is vague but number of shots ("2") is specific. 2 things that indicates: beers can be considered a kick back and unwind beverage while shots are not and considered a get drunk drink; and since he was specific on the number of shots but vague on beers I doubt "couple" = 2.
Just because your reflexes are there, doesn't mean you have enough time to use them. When I was younger I ran over my grandparent's neighbor's mailbox while I was texting on my phone, i'm lucky it wasn't a person.
