Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol

October 29, 2012

Driving DUI in Los Angeles, New York, or Anywhere: Never a Good Idea, Especially If You Drive a School Bus

What should be done to prevent school bus drivers from driving under the influence of alcohol in Los Angeles, New York, and other big cities? Where do we draw the line between the need to respect the freedom of individuals and the need to protect kids from reckless, careless DUI driving?

New York legislators and policy makers are mulling over these and other similar questions this week, in the wake of new legislation proposed by New York state Senator Charles Fuschillo and Nassau County DA Kathleen Rice, that would require school bus drivers to blow into breathalyzer devices before being able to drive kids around.

If this New York law passes, it would be the first of its kind in the country; and it might set a president for how lawmakers here in California try to stamp out the problem of driving under the influence in Los Angeles.

Why Are Lawmakers So “Ginned Up” to Stop DUI Bus Driving?

The answer is pretty simple: a spate of DUI bus driving incidents over the past month have alarmed parents, lawmakers, and the general populace.

Here are three:

1. On October 3rd, Frederick Flowers, a 66-year old bus driver, crashed into a house while carrying five kids in his school bus.

Police believe that Flowers passed out behind the wheel prior to the crash. The kids, who ranged in age from 5 years old to 8 years old, miraculously survived without injury.

2. Less than two weeks later, 40-year old Robert Stundis got stopped and arrested for driving a school bus under the influence.

He tested to have a blood alcohol concentration of 0.23%. That’s nearly 3 times the maximum allowable BAC level of 0.08%, according to Southern California DUI law. Police found a half empty bottle of vodka on his school bus and charged Stundis with endangering the welfare of children, DWI while driving a school bus, and DWI with child passengers.

3. Lastly, on October 22nd, 47-year old James Sommer, crashed into a tree while trying to park his school bus.

Authorities later arrested him under suspicion of DWI; one girl, 12-year old, had to go to the hospital with minor injuries.

Obviously, this rash of bus driver DUI arrests is viscerally distributing. But would it be helpful to compel school buses to install interlock ignition devices? How could we measure the results of such an initiative? And would any increase in safety persist for years or decades? Would legislation be worth the expense and legal battle?

These questions are certainly intriguing, but if you’re struggling with a DUI charge yourself, you are probably less interested in how to change the world (or fix society’s larger problems) than you are in avoiding jail time, minimizing your punishments, and figuring out how to rebuild your life and reputation after your arrest.

To that end, talk to Mr. Michael Kraut of Los Angeles’s Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers about your legal needs. Attorney Kraut is an ex-prosecutor who spent 14 plus years “on the other side” trying to put defendants for DUI crimes behind bars. Now, as a defense attorney, he uses his knowledge of the mindset of prosecutors – and the relationships he has cultivated over the years – to deliver excellent service for his clients.

October 24, 2012

If Only Your Glendale DUI Punishment Would Be as Lenient: Pittsburgh Steelers’ Alameda Ta’amu Faces Two Games without Pay for DUI… and 14 Other Criminal Charges!

by Michael Kraut

After recently getting arrested for driving under the influence in Glendale – and possibly for other charges on top of that – you face a scary and, quite frankly, fraught legal future.

But the world is unfair.

Sometimes, people can commit truly egregious actions and receive little to no penalties. Consider, for instance, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Alameda Ta’amu, who was arrested early Sunday morning (i.e. Saturday night) for 15 separate criminal charges, including DUI, aggravated assault, misdemeanor accident causing damage, resisting arrest, felony fleeing police, and other assorted “bad stuff.”

A sports writer for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review suggested that the Steelers should have cut Ta’amu for the DUI incident. But the management decided just simply to dock his pay for two games. Mike Tomlan, the Steelers’ coach, told a local radio station “we deem his actions as a detrimental effort and we are treating it as such… the other ramifications and so forth of the situation, I am not at liberty to discuss at this time, but we thought it was very important that we act quickly in terms of addressing this and we can focus our efforts on the men that are planning and getting ready to meet this week’s challenge… Obviously, it’s a disturbing incident, one that we take seriously as members of this community.”

How does this all relates back to your Glendale DUI charge?

If you committed far fewer violations than Ta’amu allegedly committed, you can nevertheless wind up with a variety of unpleasant punishments, not limited to a long time behind bars; huge fees and fines; a tremendous spike in the amount of money you pay for car insurance, if you can still get a car insurance; a suspension of your driver’s license; intense probation; and damage to your reputation at work and your social life that may take months or even years to rebuild.

Your Glendale DUI situation may seem unfair – and you may feel a range of emotions including but not limited to depression, overwhelm, frustration, fury, and helplessness. The key to moving forward in your life is to start to understand what options might be available to you.

To that end, you may benefit a lot by getting in touch with attorney Michael Kraut of Glendale’s Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers. As a Harvard Law School educated ex-prosecutor of Glendale DUI crimes, Mr. Kraut understands on a firsthand basis how prosecutors will likely treat your case, and he can develop a DUI defense that’s most appropriate and that has the best chances of getting the best results.

October 22, 2012

Failed A Beverly Hills DUI Breathalyzer Test? Maybe It Wasn’t the Alcohol That Did It! (Wait Till’ You See What This Woman Drank…)

by Michael Kraut

As someone who recently failed a breathalyzer test for driving under the influence in Beverly Hills, you are probably feeling ashamed, humiliated, and terrified about the potential legal consequences.

Even if you didn’t cause any damage or hurt anyone – and thus you cannot be subjected to punishments per California Vehicle Code section 23153(a) or 23153(b) – you no doubt fear going to jail, having your license stripped, and paying potentially thousands of dollars in fines and fees (and that’s the tip of the iceberg).

On the other hand, you may be prematurely judging yourself as “guilty.”

In fact, a surprising amount of research suggests that many breathalyzer tests for Beverly Hills DUI and DUI elsewhere, can be flawed and potentially extremely misleading. A variety of factors can lead to false positives. For instance, if you are diabetic, you may wind up in a pathological metabolic state known as ketoacidosis, in which you produce compound known as ketones; these can cause a “positive” to register on a Beverly Hills DUI breath test.

A similar “skewing towards the DUI positive” can happen if you’re on a restricted carbohydrate diet. Low carb dieters often enter a metabolic state known as ketosis, during which they produce similar compounds to the compounds that diabetics produce when they are in ketoacidosis. In fact, one of the big (and misguided) criticisms of low carb diets has to do with confusion over healthy ketosis and unhealthy ketoacidosis. These are actually two very different metabolic states.

Getting back to the point… many different things can throw off a breathalyzer reading, including what you have recently eaten, how the officer calibrated the machine, how deeply you blow into the machine, and so forth.

Sometimes people do really weird things that can ALSO influence BAC readings.

Consider, for instance, a crazy story reported out of Middletown, Connecticut, where a local woman nearly crashed her car on October 5th after losing control. Local police put her through the paces of a field sobriety test and also gave her a blood alcohol test. They found that she had a BAC of 0.17% — which, as regular readers of our Beverly Hills DUI lawyer blog know, is over twice the legal limit for DUI here in Southern California, per CVC 23152(b).

What’s interesting about this woman is that she drank half a bottle of hand sanitizer before getting behind the wheel.

You read that right: half a bottle of hand sanitizer. Yikes!

According to reports, the amount of alcohol she consumed was equal to 32 shots of vodka. No wonder she had a BAC of 0.17%! One wonders whether the woman suffered from a condition known as Pica, which is a disorder characterized by a craving to eat nonfood items, such as sand, dirt, plastic, metal, and all sorts of other crazy stuff.

In any event, if you need help dealing with your Beverly Hills DUI case, get in touch with attorney Michael Kraut today to set up a free and thorough case consultation.

October 17, 2012

Burbank DUI Sports News: Mark Ditka Busted for DUI for Forth Time – Bad News for the Bears Even As Their Session Is Starting Out Pretty Well…

by Michael Kraut

Even if you’ve been arrested for driving under the influence in Burbank, and you’re not a sports fan, you likely are familiar with the Chicago Bears’ legendary old coach Mike Ditka – if not for his football legacy then at least for his appearance in snarky TV ads (or maybe his football-related wine label).

But Ditka’s brand has been challenged by the strange behavior of his sons, Mark and Michael.

Michael has been arrested multiple times for driving under the influence –including a stop in April 2011 that we discussed at length here on our Burbank DUI blog. Curiously, in the 2011 case, Michael lashed out that he had been stopped because if his family name.

His brother, Mark, meanwhile, has also been in the headlines for DUI arrests multiple times – in fact, last Sunday he scored his fourth DUI arrest in Deerfield, a suburb of Chicago. According to local news reports, police saw him driving erratically and pulled him over. They found Hydrocodone pills in his car (a prescription opiate – which Mark apparently had no prescription slip for). Plus, Mark lacked insurance and had been driving on a suspended license. When he refused to take a blood or breathalyzer test, he was arrested and held on a $25,000 bond.

Ditka was arrested last year around the same time, according to the Chicago Tribune, for driving with a BAC of around twice the legal limit. In Burbank, that limit is 0.08% BAC, as defined by California Vehicle Code Section 23153. That case was tossed because Ditka’s chewing tobacco likely skewed the results of his breathalyzer test. In his other two DUI arrests, he managed to get the charges lowered.

But Ditka’s situation illustrates both dangers and opportunities for people who have been arrested multiple times for driving under the influence in Burbank.

On the one hand, with a properly positioned and executed defense, you can do things like effectively challenge a breath test reading. After all, as we’ve discussed dozens of times here on this blog, breathalyzer tests can be compromised due to innumerable factors, including the presence of chewing tobacco; whether you are a diabetic or not (ketones produced by ketoacidosis on the breath can artificially inflate your BAC rating); and diverse other factors.

On the other hand, if you get arrested and convicted for multiple DUIs in Burbank or elsewhere, prosecutors can enjoy more and more different kinds of legal leverage against you.

For instance, if you are arrested and convicted for three DUIs within a 10-year period, prosecutors can try to convict you of a felony for what would ordinarily be a misdemeanor offense. Likewise, as you get more and more DUI convictions, you will face an escalation in penalties, such as the amount of money you have to pay in fines and fees, the length of your jail sentence, the extent and severity of your probation, the amount of time you have to spend in alcohol education classes, the duration of your California license suspension, and much more.

To respond aggressively and effectively to the difficult charges against you, look to the Burbank DUI criminal defense team at the Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers to equip you with a sound legal defense. Attorney Kraut is a highly respected and highly motivated ex-prosecutor who uses his Harvard Law School education and deep connections with the Los Angeles DUI community to get excellent results for his clients.

October 15, 2012

Long Beach DUI Lessons from Scary Injury Crash in Rancho Cucamonga – Three High School Girls Hurt

by Michael Kraut

If you injured someone while driving under the influence in Long Beach or elsewhere in Southern California, you likely feel tremendous regret and panic. Whether the accident was your fault or not – or only partially so – you are probably confused about your legal rights, and you want to know what you can do to protect yourself.

Consider the following news item to help place your arrest into context.

Last week, in Rancho Cucamonga, 29-year-old Cory Holker apparently lost control of his silver Toyota Camry on Base Line Road as he tried to pass another car. The Camry flipped over a curb, smashed into a tree and spiraled around and hit three Alta Loma High School girls – two freshman and one sophomore. A local resident heard the accident and the screams and called 911. All three girls were taken to the hospital with injuries – and one had to be pried out from underneath the car – but fortunately, all three are expected to survive.

Holker, on the other hand, faces a difficult road ahead of him, legally speaking.

He allegedly failed a breathalyzer test at the scene – and even though Long Beach DUI breathalyzer tests are notoriously unreliable, as we’ve talked about many times on this blog, it’s still not a great piece of evidence for him to “explain away.” In addition, he was cited for speeding, failing to wear a seatbelt, and following another car too closely. Holker also has a substantial record of citations, and he now faces a felony Southern California DUI count as well.

When most people read stories like these in the news, they immediately feel empathy and sympathy for the victims – as well, they should. It’s easy for the not-involved to demonize DUI drivers, especially drivers who hit and hurt other people who do other ìdumb/illegal stuffî while DUI. But it’s important to be compassionate – not just towards victims, but also towards defendants. The reality is that there is often much more to most Long Beach DUI cases than meets the eye – or that can be conveyed through a simple news blurb or blog post.

Consider your situation, for instance.

Even if you believe that you were in the wrong or guilty of DUI or other driving-related crimes, odds are you do not see yourself as a cartoonish villain or in morally black and white terms. Your situation is complex, and you’d like a little bit of compassion as you struggle to understand what motivated you, what you can do in the future to prevent getting into similar situations, and what you might be able to do to repair any harm that you may have accidentally caused.

The team here at the Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers has tremendous experience and a unique perspective on Los Angeles DUI cases.

Attorney Kraut is a Harvard Law School educated ex-prosecutor – he spent the bulk of his career prosecuting DUI cases – and that experience gives him a powerful and informed perspective on the whole process. It’s helped him to be a more effective and intuitive Long Beach DUI defense attorney. Find out more about Attorney Kraut’s credentials and record for service here on this site, or get in touch with his team today for a confidential consultation about your defense options.

October 12, 2012

Nightmare on the 10: Bad News Bears Actress, Sammi Kane Kraft, Killed in a Los Angeles DUI Accident

by Michael Kraut

Fatal Los Angeles DUI accidents are always horrific, but they are somehow more so when they involve young people and children.

Last week, Sammi Kane Kraft, one of the stars of the 2005 remake of the movie Bad News Bears (with Billy Bob Thornton as the coach), died when a car she was in got rear ended by a truck on the 10 Freeway at around 1.30 in the morning. Kraft was a passenger in the Audi – her friend, 21-year-old, Molly Kate Adams was driving. Police say that Adams had been driving under the influence in Los Angeles at the time of the crash – she survived with moderate injuries.

Kraft and Adams had been returning from a night out checking out bands, when the tragedy struck.

October 10, 2012

It Should Be Commonsense Not to Allow Your 14-Year-Old Daughter to Drive DUI in Los Angeles…

by Michael Kraut

Just because you’ve recently been arrested for driving under the influence in Los Angeles doesn’t mean that you have no knowledge of right and wrong or no standards. Far from it! In fact, odds are, you probably resent being lumped in with other DUI defendants!

Understand that there is an enormous spectrum, when it comes to DUI offenses. On the one hand, there are the perennial, serial DUI offenders who get arrested and convicted multiple times. But this “species” of Los Angeles DUI defendant is surprisingly rare, and even people who fall into this category generally deserve more respect, empathy, and support.

On the other end of the spectrum, you can find people who commit minor mistakes – or who actually make no mistakes at all but rather wind up as victims of overzealous officers at Los Angeles DUI check points.

But anyone with a moral compass might wonder about what happened recently up in Napavine, Washington, where local state patrol officers arrested a 14-year-old girl from Portland, who had allegedly flipped a van while driving under the influence. The incident took place the Sunday before last on Interstate 5, near the town of Chehalis.

You might think that this was just a case of a rebellious teenager borrowing her parents’ van and going for a joy ride. Nope. Initial report suggests that circumstances were far weirder. In the van with her was a 51-year-old Portland man and a 16-year-old runaway girl.

The driver and both passengers suffered minor injuries in the rollover. But local reports from KATU suggest that it’s not yet clear how the three people know each other.

The 14-year-old girl, meanwhile, faces charges of driving without a license, driving DUI, and being a minor in possession of marijuana.

Who knows what was actually going on up there?

If you’ve been tasks with defending against similar (or even more severe) charges pursuant to your Los Angeles DUI arrest, you might appreciate the revelation that this case appears to be far more complicated than superficial analysis reveals. Indeed, many DUI cases are wrapped up with strange subtleties, and only a thorough investigation and detailed legal work can help defendants get cleared or at least put up their best possible defense.

Attorney Michael Kraut of the Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers spent a significant portion of his life working as a city prosecutor (14 plus years as Senior Deputy District Attorney), so he has a really good feel for how prosecutors like to go after Los Angeles DUI defendants.

Attorney Kraut now uses that knowledge to help people like you with creative, legally taut defenses to their DUI charges. Get in touch with attorney Kraut and his team today to go over what he can do to protect your interests.

October 8, 2012

Did a “Pink Elephant” Cause Your Long Beach DUI Crash, Too?

by Michael Kraut

Your recent Long Beach DUI accident and arrest was humiliating enough.

Hopefully, no one got hurt. And hopefully, you did not compound your woes by offering a preposterous explanation for your behavior, like 31-year-old Samuel Phipps recently did when Delaware State Police stopped him on I-95 and hit him with his seventh lifetime DUI charge.

The 31-year-old told State Police that he had smoked a kind of drug known as “wet” – which consists of a marijuana cigarette laced with the PCP – prior to taking a ride in his Land Rover the Friday night before last. As he cruised southbound on I-295, he hallucinated and thought he saw a pink elephant in the road. Thus spooked, he veered off into the guardrail near Route 141.

According to a Delaware State Police statement, the trooper who found Phipps interviewed the driver, who told him “that the accident was a result of… swerving to avoid an elephant he observed running in the path of his vehicle.”

Phipps was busted for his unlucky number seven DUI offense and hit additionally with the charge of driving without insurance. Instead of being sent to jail, he was committed to the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution and held on a bond of $21,000.

If, like Phipps, you’ve been hit with multiple counts of driving under the influence in Long Beach or elsewhere, you could be facing substantial jail time, even if you did not hurt anyone and prosecutors thus cannot charge you per California Vehicle Code Sections 23153(a) or 23153(b).

In fact, as your number of DUI arrest/convictions increases, so does the leverage of prosecutors.

If you get convicted for three DUIs within a 10-year span in California, for instance, your third DUI – which would ordinarily be a misdemeanor – can be charged as a felony count, even absent any other legal violations. Plus, other penalties get ratcheted up: you’ll face longer time in alcohol school, a longer license suspension, stricter/longer probation terms, more fines and fees, and likely a bigger spike in your auto insurance rates, assuming that you can still drive and carry insurance.

Of course, if you’re getting arrested three or four or seven times for DUI – or for other crimes – you may need more than the help of a good Long Beach DUI defense attorney. You may also need therapy to deal with other crises in your life that may be compelling you to take refuge in alcohol or medications.

The team at law offices of Michael A. DeMayo can help you appreciate what you might be up against and give you practical, sensible, actionable advice.

Learn more about Attorney Kraut’s background as a Harvard Law School educated former prosecutor here on our website, or connect with us now for a free, completely confidential evaluation of your Long Beach DUI case.

September 26, 2012

Careful What You Say After Your Pasadena DUI: For Instance, Don’t Post “LOL! I Got a DUI!” on Facebook, Like 18-Year-Old Paula Asher Did

by Michael Kraut

Your recent Pasadena DUI arrest was no laughing matter…or at least it shouldn’t have been.

Unfortunately, recently arrested defendants have a peculiar way of getting themselves into lots more trouble by doing dumb things after an accident/arrest.

Consider the case of Kentucky teenager, Paula Asher, who wound up getting a two day jail sentence for posting about her recent DUI accident on Facebook. Her message was simple and flip: “my dumb a** got a DUI and hit a car LOL.”

Local police said Ms. Asher hit a car carrying four teenagers and then tried to drive away from the scene of the accident. No one was hurt, fortunately. If you injure someone while DUI in Pasadena, you could face felony charges – with a possible jail sentence of greater than one year – according to California Vehicle Code sections 23153(a) and 23153(b).

Ms. Asher’s “LOL” comment infuriated the parents of the four teenagers she hit, and they complained to the judge at a July 20 hearing. The judge ordered the teenager to take down her Facebook page, but Asher did not comply. As a result, the judge sentenced her to two days in jail for contempt. She eventually relented and apologized, but still, damage had been done.

Asher’s case powerfully illustrates two key points:

1) What you do after your Pasadena DUI stop and arrest matters.

You can still say or do stupid things that can make your situation far more uncomfortable, legally speaking.

2) Our reactions to traumatic events often surprise even ourselves.

Odds are that Ms. Asher was not literally “laughing out loud” after she hit that car. She likely was just trying to process a scary event in her own way – her words just came out wrong. Understand that you may say or do things that are not in line with your values, or that you would never do “in real life.”

It can be difficult to protect yourself and those you love from harsh consequences from a Pasadena DUI. To that end, connect with the team here at the Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers in Pasadena for experienced, grounded advice. Attorney Kraut is no stranger to DUI cases – he spent 14 years as a city prosecutor prior to becoming a criminal defense lawyer, so he knows how prosecutors tend to treat Pasadena DUI defendants like you. He can advise you carefully and methodically to help you get best results.

September 21, 2012

Avoid Long Beach DUI by Using Your New iPhone 5 Safely

by Michael Kraut

No one wants to get charged with Long Beach DUI – or DUI anywhere in Southern California, for that matter. But if you’ve just recently bought a new iPhone 5, and you are drooling over the awesome features and making fun of your friends who still have “dinosaur” iPhones – it might behoove you to engage in a little prophylaxis.

As we talked about in our last blog post, people who text or otherwise manipulate their iPhone 5s while driving – particularly while driving while under the influence of alcohol or drugs – are at a highly elevated risk for causing accidents and injuries. To prevent disaster — or to clean up your act after you’ve been charged with Los Angeles DUI — consider these tips for enjoying your iPhone 5 safely:

1. Shut off the phone – and the ringer – for short trips.

You need your iPhone 5 with you to provide an emergency communications channel for your family. But if you’re just hopping in the car for a short jaunt down the 405 — which means that you must be driving in middle of the night, since that’s the only time when the 405 is not log jammed with perpetual sig-alerts! — just turn off the phone. Don’t give yourself the temptation to check your phone or hear a call. Rip the band-aid off.

2. Track your “near misses.”

If you’ve become addicted to texting while driving or chatting on the phone while driving — and you know it’s time to stop before you get hit with a driving DUI while distracted in Long Beach charge — then start to notice/track your bad habits. Any time you catch yourself checking your phone — or even getting the urge to check your phone! — make a mental note, and then write in a journal afterwards about the experience. Get to understand yourself. Without appropriate self-knowledge – into your behaviors, habits, and yearnings – you’re going to be fighting an uphill battle. Pay attention to the triggers that drive you to make dangerous choices, and figure out how to deal with those triggers before you even get behind the wheel.

3. If you’ve gotten into a car crash while DUI in Long Beach or while texting, now is the time to begin to change your ways.

Yes, some damage might have been done – and you might have even caused injuries or damage. And, yes, you may inevitably have to face penalties, such as fines and fees, license suspension, insurance rate bumps, and even jail time. But you can choose to learn lessons from your experience and thus become a safer driver and a better Long Beach citizen.

You don’t have to go through this by yourself!

Connect with the team here at the Kraut Criminal & DUI Lawyers in Long Beach for powerful assistance. Attorney Michael Kraut is a former prosecutor and well respected Long Beach DUI criminal defense lawyer. Get in touch with him and his team to coordinate an appropriate strategy.