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Thursday, August 07, 2008

Editorial: Get Familiar With Strict DWI Laws



      For years people have been hearing the refrain: “Drink responsibly” and seeing the presumed level of intoxication quantified at a 0.08 percent level of blood alcohol content. Some may have even worked out the formula for their own body weight — X drinks over X minutes equals 0.0X percent. They would be better off spending their time learning to recite the alphabet backward, one of the tasks in the field sobriety test administered by officers.
       If a driver can't perform those tasks to the officer's satisfaction, that becomes part of the evidence, just like the blood alcohol number. And the officer's subjective judgment about how well you know your ZYX's could trump a 0.07 or a 0.06. Deputy District Attorney Gary Cade even boasts of getting a conviction at 0.04 percent — half the level of presumed intoxication. Anyone who drinks and drives is running a risk, he says.
       Anyone who believes he can drink responsibly — share a bottle of wine over dinner with friends to celebrate a special occasion like a promotion — risks being arrested, prosecuted, hit with legal fees, an interlock, public humiliation and perhaps losing the promotion or the job.
       This is a new chapter in New Mexico's war on DWI, and some observers say a logical progression. That would ring truer if the system could handle all its cases; the dismissal rate in Metropolitan Court is still around 25 percent. Some of those who skate are less responsible drinkers who blow twice the presumptive level or higher. Nor can the system even ensure that the offenders who have been ordered to install ignition interlocks are in compliance.
       That's all beside the point. People who think DWI priorities have gotten out of whack have the recourse of talking the situation over with their legislators. But unless the law is changed, drinking responsibly probably means drinking nothing but water if you're going to get behind the wheel.
       

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