8/4/2019 Albuquerque DUI Attorney Explians Intoxication

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Understanding Intoxication

If you are arrested for DUI, it's essential that you avail yourself of a good DUI Attorney to fight your case.

You will want one that understands intoxication levels and their impact on DUI law.

1. What does DUI stand for?

Driving Under Influenced is considered a criminal offense. It is the charge that a person is not allowed to

operate a motor vehicle on a public thoroughfare while ''Influence.'' The wording of the DUI statutes is

not: ''driving while drunk.''

2. What is the meaning of the word: ''Influence''?

An individual does not need to be drunk to be deemed "Influence" however an individual is Influence if 

they are drunk.

DUI statute determines "Influenced" by two standards. Primarily, a driver is considered ''Influence'' inthe event that the use of an alcoholic beverage, controlled substance, drug, or any combination of these

causes him or her to lose the ''normal'' use of ''mental'' faculties or ''physical'' faculties. Second, a driver

is deemed "Influence" once the driver's body has an alcohol concentration of .08 or more.

3. What determines what is normal and what factors were the normal mental and physical faculties

determined by? How is this defined?

The law is referring to the ''normal mental and physical faculties'' of the person who was arrested. This

term isn't meant to infer the normal faculties as attributed to a fictitious person, the jurors of a DUI

criminal trial, or the arresting officer. "Normal' instead is a term used for a range of measurement of an

arrested person’s faculties. For instance, you could not determine "normal" as a unit of measurement.

Instead, it is defined as a range between two points on the ruler, for example: in the middle of the 3"

and 9" sections.

4. Is the alcohol concentration .08?

Definition of alcohol concentration defined by statute:

A: # grams of alcohol for each 100 milliliters of blood;

B: # grams of alcohol for each 210 liters of breath; OR

C: # grams of alcohol for each 67 milliliters of urine.

It's almost impossible to know if your concentration is .08 or more, if you had been drinking. The

concentrations above also can refer to different portions of alcohol, so one concentration can produce

an innocent verdict while another can produce a guilty one. The statutory definition of intoxicationindicates that, it's additionally possible for a person to be found innocent of intoxication if there isn't

any loss of his/her normal mental or physical faculties; however, a person may still be thought to be

guilty of intoxication due to a .08 blood alcohol concentration.

Legally it's a crime of DUI to drive a vehicle if your body alcohol concentration is .08 or higher. The crime

is not necessarily in having a .08-or-higher body alcohol concentration before or after driving. The time

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at which the test was taken can be quite relevant in determining whether or not a person had a blood

alcohol concentration of .08 at the time s/he was actually driving a vehicle.

Both the defense and the prosecution of the case may find challenges inherent in the timing of the

sobriety test. A .08 alcohol concentration test is rarely done exactly when one is pulled over. An alcohol

concentration test can be administered 45 minutes to an hour and 15 minutes after driving. When the

test has been delayed this long, it is almost impossible to be certain of the person's alcohol level during

the time he or she was operating the vehicle.

It is not easy to determine whether or not someone is Influenced while driving. There are multiple

variables that can affect the final approach to your DUI defense.

For more information, please visit http://www.duialbuquerque.com or call (505) 903-7776 to schedule a

free consultation.