SterlingAiello39
De Communautique.
For the duration of a drunk driving investigation, police will usually administer some so-called "field sobriety tests" (FSTs). This may contain a battery of three to five tests, usually selected by the officer; these can include walk-and-turn, one-leg-stand, horizontal gaze nystagmus, fingers-to-thumb, finger-to-nose, Rhomberg (modified position of attention), alphabet recitation, or hand-pat. In an increasing number of law enforcement agencies in DUI Lawyer Orange County, California and over the nation, a "standardized" battery of three tests will be given - walk-and-turn, one-leg-stand and nystagmus - and they must be scored objectively rather than utilizing an officer's subjective opinion.
How valid are these FSTs? Not very, according to DUI Lawyer Orange County CA Taylor, a former prosecutor and the writer of the leading legal textbook "Drunk Driving Defense, 6th edition". The tests are fundamentally "designed for failure". In 1991, Taylor reports, Dr . Spurgeon Cole of Clemson University conducted a study on the accuracy of field sobriety tests. His staff videotaped 21 individuals performing 6 common field sobriety tests, then showed the tapes to 14 police officers and asked them to decide whether the suspects had "had a lot to drink to operate a vehicle. " Not known to the officers, the blood-alcohol concentration of each of the 21 subjects was. 00%. The results: 46% of the time the officers gave their opinion that the subject was too inebriated to drive. Quite simply, the FSTs were hardly more accurate at predicting intoxication than flipping a coin. Cole and Nowaczyk, "Field Sobriety Tests: Are They Designed for Failure? ", 79 Perceptual and Motor Skills 99 (1994).
How about the new, improved "standardized" DUI tests? Research funded by the National Highway Traffic Administration determined that the three most effective field sobriety tests were walk-and-turn, one-leg stand, and horizontal gaze nystagmus. Yet, even using these supposedly more accurate -- and objectively scored -- tests, the researchers discovered that 47% of the subjects who does have been arrested in relation to test performance actually had blood-alcohol concentrations of significantly less than the legal limit. In other words, very nearly 1 / 2 of all persons "failing" the tests are not legally under the influence of alcohol!
According to the Orange County DUI Attorneylawyers in Mr. Taylor's Southern California law firm, the fact these tests are largely unfamiliar to most people, and that they receive under excessively adverse conditions, make them more difficult for people to perform. As few as two miscues in performance can lead to an individual being classified as "impaired" because of alcohol consumption once the problem may actually function as the result of unfamiliarity with the test.
