This very special episode of the the Angry Libertarian Alliance is brought to you by the latest abuse of government power by the DC Police (and DMV). As this WaPo story relates, Debra Bolton had a glass of wine with dinner and ended up in jail for blowing a .03. Let me repeat that for emphasis, 'point oh fucking three.' Most of you are probably thinking that that's well below the legal limit, and it is. However,
Bolton, 45, an energy lawyer and single mother of two who lives in Alexandria, had just run into a little-known piece of D.C. law: In the District, a driver can be arrested with as little as .01 blood-alcohol content.
As D.C. police officer Dennis Fair, who arrested Bolton on May 15, put it in an interview recently: "If you get behind the wheel of a car with any measurable amount of alcohol, you will be dealt with in D.C. We have zero tolerance. . . . Anything above .01, we can arrest."
Bolton fought the charges and got them dropped (prosecutors apparently have better things to do). Annoyance over, right? Oh hell no! Time for that bastion of abusive bureaucracy, the DMV, to get involved. Even though the charges were dropped and there was no conviction, the DC DMV "warned that it would suspend her driving privileges at the end of this month unless she went through an alcohol prevention program."
Corey Buffo, the DMV's general counsel, explained that the agency drops its procedures only after a case goes to trial and is dismissed on its merits. "Our burden of proof is lower" than the Superior Court's, he said. "Not enough evidence for them may be enough evidence for us." Yesterday, the DMV decided not to suspend her privileges and issued her a warning instead.
Does anyone else smell a violation of 'due process' rights, because I sure do. Suspending someone's driving privileges based on an arrest alone looks like it's ripe for a Constitutional challenge.
Lesson of the day: Don't drink in DC. At all. Ever.
From today's follow-up story, it looks like MADD, the DC Council member who sponsored the law in the first place, and various other interest groups are backpedalling on this piece-of-shit, nanny state law.
Even D.C. Council member Carol Schwartz (R-At Large), who has sponsored legislation to lower the legal limit for drunken driving, said she was not aware that police officers are arresting drivers who have as little as .01 percent blood alcohol content -- less than from drinking a glass of wine or beer -- in their systems. Nor did she think that such a policy was a good idea.
...
D.C.'s zero-tolerance policy goes back about seven years. In 1998, at the same time Schwartz introduced an amendment to lower the blood alcohol limit for intoxication from .10 to .08 with much media attention, then-Council member Sandy Allen introduced a provision that lowered to .03 the level that a driver could be presumed impaired by alcohol. Both measures passed.
Gee, maybe people should be careful before passing stupid laws. Fuckers.
Yours truly,
Mr. X
...grrr...
UPDATE: If you want to do something about it, then contacting the DC Council would be a good start.
7 comments:
Couldn't agree with you more. In fact, me and my wife have decided to not eat in DC again! This is such BS that it makes my head explode. To leave a judgement up to a police officer for a person who had a .03 is a freaking joke. I'll stay in VA for my dinning, one less tax payment the city will collect!
All this does is allow them to harass people, collect more money for an already beauracratic gov't and put more money in lawyers. What's to say that a cop who is having a "bad" day decides to use his/her judgement and lock you up and treat you like a common criminal for a drink because they "think" you are drunk. This is a crime and people need to speak up.
And with a 10% tax on DC dining anyway, they're not helping themselves any.
Yours truly,
Mr. X
...don't forget to smash the state...
this is a much bigger problem than just dining in one place or having a drink in another.it's only a matter of time before this bullshit spreads around to every city,county and state in this country!all thanks to hypocrite fuckers like MADD and the cowardly asswipe politicians and bureaucrats who will do anything to score points with such groups and of course to make an easy buck for the state even if it all meant misleading the public and destroying the greatest thing this country once had to offer , FREEDOM!I grew up in a place where laws restrictive to personal freedom were passed right and left and human rights and civil liberties were constantly stepped on and I can tell you with all honesty that what's going on right now is relatively comparable to what I saw!it saddens me to see most americans take freedom for granted completely oblivious to how truely precious and FRAGILE it is! I fought for this country and I wasn't even born here neither was any of my family! I did it because I believed in the IDEA of the USA as the home of the free! those assholes who will do ANYTHING to push their own agendas or serve their personal interests, all at the expense of the democracy and freedom in this country don't fuckin deserve to live in it!
ban alcohol and you wont have any duis hell they give us another supid law everyday thank god we are a free country i should say free to what ever we are allowed to do prisons are full of innocent good people that 100 years ago would not be criminals because that was when we had a free country why sell alcohol at bars restauraunts concerts ball games,etc when they know u have to drive home a simple diner celebrating your anniversary could cost u your job thousands in fine maybe a little more humiliation sit in jail lose respect from co workers family and friends the laws are so bad noe if you hav the flu and r taking nyquil u willl get a dui if they want to be madd they should be mad we no longer live in a free country like i said its a catc 22 as long as alcohol is legal the penalties for duis will keep going up and the big beer manufactuers like budweiseer become more rich we will keep fillin prisons who might of had a little wine with diner end up in jail its a misdemeanor how could the punishments be so tuff eiter ban alcohol or stop violating our rights and let it be like it was years ago before madd came along or the best is open container in your yard well if its legal how the fuck am i gonna drink it if its not open half these madd protestors are alcoholics them selfs dont ban it just dont drink it and drive anything might as well make bullets but u cant put them your gun to go hunting it os what it is but as long as alcohol is legal the more arrests will be made and more money in fines and devices to blow in to start your car thats the solution all cars should have to have one installed o but then i forgot what about the people who take their meds and drive maybe we outta keep them in doors at all time and who am i hurting if i dont ware a seatbelt its my life in this free country
I spent a night in jail for testing 1 beer over the legal limit. I was pulled over, 3/4 of the way home, for driving 7 mph over the limit in a city where 15 mph over the limit is the norm-- I wasn't even issued a speeding ticket! I remember the entire night clearly, had no problem with the field sobriety test, and absolutely no criminal or traffic record in my 12 years of driving.
None of that mattered, straight to jail. Thrown in gen pop with the rapists and murders (who were actually much more polite than the cops and guards).
Mandatory 6 month license revocation before I was even allowed a trial or attorney, and now I have to use an $80/month blow and go for 6 months. I drank, on average, 1-2 times a month prior to my arrest. Really sticking it to us ranging alcoholics.
Speaking of blow and go. Did you know the actually cause more accidents than they prevent? Did you know a staggering number of people arrested for dui now committed suicide? I would wager MADD causes more deaths than it claims to prevent, as if I believe their claims.
Fuck madd. Something needs to be done. Second dui within a ten year period. 45 day mandatory sentence. Going to lose job. Effects the whole family. Nothing but a modern day witch hunt.
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