Outcome: DUI Reduced to Failure to Exercise Due Care in Chatham County
Date: February 24, 2011
Court: Garden City Municipal Court
Actual Court Judgment: Actual Judgment-Banker’s DUI Reduced to Failure to Exercise Due Care with .152%
Description
The man, James is a Banker in Savannah, Georgia. James plead guilty to Failure to exercise due care. He was happy because the DUI is gone. James was leaving downtown Savannah and got pulled over. The officer asks James to exit the vehicle with his license. The officer smells a very strong odor of some type of alcoholic beverage coming from James breath. The report says James was swaying, had red, bloodshot eyes, and slurred speech. James tells the cop, “I only had two beers.” The officer gives James the Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus field sobriety test and saw six clues. James does the One Leg Stand field sobriety test and the the cop saw two clues. James does the Walk and Turn test and the cop saw four clues. James then tests positive on the Alco-Sensor FST at .157. Next, James feels the cold hard metal of cuffs going on his wrists. He was arrested and charged with DUI/alcohol, Failure to maintain lane, and Following too closely. He was taken to the Chatham County Jail and gave a breath test of .152 on the Intoxilyzer 5000. We got ready for the Preliminary hearing by sending off a subpoena to the arresting police agency demanding the Police reports, statements by defendant, audio and video tapes, repair and service records of video cameras, photographs of defendant, independent test forms, CAD printouts, mobile data terminal printouts, police dispatch records, Intake forms, chemical test results, log sheets, technical data on intoxilyzer, repair and calibration records on intoxilyzer, inspection certificates, and gas chromatograph printouts. In the end, James took a negotiated plea. The court agreed to drop the DUI and the Failure to maintain lane and the Following too closely charges to Failure to exercise due care.
