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« We’re at a point where traffic fatalities are the lowest in 20 years,” Ramsey said. “I don’t want us to slip.” Ramsey said the public misunderstands the department’s criteria for charging people with driving under the influence, or DUI. District law, like laws in Virginia and Maryland, allow for the arrest of any driver a police officer judges to be impaired, regardless of blood alcohol level. Attorney General Robert J. Spagnoletti, who joined Ramsey in testifying before the council’s Judiciary Committee, said: “There is no evidence to suggest that this is a big problem in the District of Columbia. The system works. The number of deaths declining suggest we’re doing it right.” Last week the council passed emergency legislation that would bring D.C. law closer to laws in surrounding states. But Spagnoletti said the changes affect only the presumptions that are used in court. They do not change the threshold for arrest: an officer’s probable cause to suspect that a driver is impaired by alcohol or drugs. Spagnoletti said many DUI arrests in which drivers have a blood alcohol level below .08, the legal level for intoxication in the District, also involve drug use, which cannot be measured with a breath test. In 2004, D.C. police made 521 arrests for driving while intoxicated, or DWI, and 165 for DUI. Police also arrested 103 people who refused to be tested. Those totals do not include arrests made by the U.S. Capitol Police and others. The Washington Post has published stories about the arrests of drivers with low blood alcohol levels. One report was about the experience of Debra Bolton, a 45-year-old Virginia woman, who said she was arrested for DUI and spent five months fighting the charge after drinking one glass of wine with dinner. Her blood alcohol level was .03, and her case was not prosecuted. Spagnoletti and Ramsey took issue with her story, saying she did not pass any of the four field sobriety tests administered by the arresting officer. In an interview, Bolton said that after the officer told her she was under arrest, she replied: “Why? I passed all your little tests.”
DUI Keeps DuBose at AA Bowie »

Ponson Arrested for DUI, DWI

Baltimore Orioles pitcher Sidney Ponson has been arrested for driving under the influence and driving while impaired.

Maryland Transportation Authority Police corporal Pamela Thorne says the arrest was made after a traffic stop at 1:31 this morning, on southbound Interstate 95, south of I-395.

Thorne says Ponson was driving a 2005 Mercedes-Benz and was stopped for following to closely. He was subsequently arrested for the traffic violation, DUI and DWI and has been released.

Ponson was previously charged with driving under the influence in Broward County, Florida, in January. That arrest came just weeks after he spent eleven days in an Aruban jail for a Christmas Day fight at a beach. He apologized for the fight and reached a settlement that involved community service and a charitable contribution.

Ponson has been on the disabled list with a calf strain and hasn’t pitched since August seventh. An MRI yesterday found a torn ligament in his thumb, and he was expected to be out of action for at least three more weeks.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 6:50 am and is filed under DUI Attorney. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.



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