California Criminal Defense Lawyer Blog

A California DUI with “implied malice” can result in a second-degree murder charge, according to the seminal California Supreme Court case, People v. Watson (1981), Cal.3d 290.

A leading article appearing in the winter issue of CRIMINAL LAW JOURNAL mailed to the California state bar’s criminal section members last week, offers ideas on how to best defend DUI defendants when there has been death or injury.

With death, you can be charged with:

1. Second degree murder

2.Gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated

3. Vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated

When there has been either injury or death, you are in a different ballpark and you need a specialist.

Why? Here is just one quote from the article:

“Due to a statutory anomaly, the actual time of incarceration
served by a defendant convicted of a felony DUI with injury
is likely to be greater than the time served by a defendant
convicted of vehicular manslaughter, while intoxicated,
without gross negligence.”

For more information on what to do if you are involved in a DUI that resulted in injury or death, contact the Law Offices of Douglas Slain.

Posted by Douglas R. Slain | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: DUI Defense , DUI/Drunk Driving , Sentencing

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As a California criminal defense lawyer who has defended DUI cases since the time of Moses, I enjoyed reading Wikipedia's entry for "driving under the influence."

Some items found there and randomly selected include:

* Norway introduced the world's first "per se" law in 1936. All 50 states in this country subsequently followed Norway's lead and all now have two categories of DUI offenses: the per se violation based on the amount of alcohol in your system (requiring no other proof of intoxication) and the other drunk driving violation (requiring independent proof, such as the testimony of a police office).

*Turkey has a limit of 0.05 for PASSENGER-LESS COMPACT CARS only; otherwise, it is 0.00% (as in zero).

*In this country California leads the way (of course) in bringing second degree murder charges if there is evidence of reckless indifference to the lives of others.

*Germany takes your license away automatically for one year if found driving with a blood count of 0.08% or higher and takes it away indefinitely if found driving with a blood count of 0.16% or higher--that it, until you pass a rigorous medical-psychological driver assessment test.

Posted by Douglas R. Slain | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: DUI Defense , DUI/Drunk Driving

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The Marin County DA is taking GI Jane back to trial. Army reservist 'G.I. Jane' going back to court

Jane Parkhurst, the Army reservist who inspired the movie, G.I. Jane, ran her Hummer H2 off a West Marin highway and was arrested for a DUI in late 2006. The matter was tried and the jury deadlocked on one count while acquitted on the other.

In California, all DUIs are charged as two counts, one for driving while intoxicating and the other for driving with a BAC of .08% or over. In this case, the jury concluded it could not decide whether or not Ms. Parkhurst was driving drunk, but that she was not driving with an over-the-limit BAC.

The acquittal on the second count might be due to the fact that the jury believed Ms. Parkhurst claim that she did all her drinking after the accident, before being tested!

The Marin DA wants to re-try her on the first count only in that double jeopardy rules out a re-trial on the count for which she was acquitted.

Posted by Douglas R. Slain | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Bay Area Cases , California Cases , Celebrity and Odd Ball , DUI Defense , DUI/Drunk Driving

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