DUI CHECKPOINTS: This weekend

Good to know. Now watch everyone drive around them.

Driving around them will also get you stopped if cops see you approaching and turning around to avoid them. If you're even a tad impaired, refuse the field sobriety tests which no one ever passes and demand that they either arrest you or let you go. Also consider handing them a Notice of Rights (available on my website) with your cards and letting the Notice speak for you.

10-4 for the alert there good buddy (hic)

Good idea there Jeffy. Lets give everybody a free pass to drive drunk. Perhaps after they kill a family and puke up their green beer they can hand over your little notice of rights paper. The cops will need something to wipe up the mess with.... Nothing like a drunk dime store attorney...

I'm not advocating driving while imapired by any amount of anything, but if you're an addict and likely to do it, you can avoid helping to convict yourself as most criminals do and make the police do their work.

Guess I'll drink at home.

hey jeffy how about posting the numbers or websites of places were these people who are addicted as you say can get help with their addiction and not sherk their personal responsiblities by "getting away" with DUI

The police doing their work with these road blocks. Why dont you tell us what happens if a person refuses a field sobriety test, or a breathalizer test.

I am not sure what they do in this case of check points,but I know if you get pulled over for DUI and you refuse the field sobriety test,you automatically lose your license for a year

I doubt very much Mr. Spangler wants to see drunk drivers get away with doing it and go kill someone... I believe he means to warn responsible drinkers not to get railroaded into a DUI because you had 2 beers down the road and happen to have someone spill some on you or something of the sort....Come on people... common sense says if your too drunk to drive and you get anywhere near a DUI checkpoint, its pretty hard to get away with it.

Rely on your personal counsel for legal advice, but it is my understanding that in PA you do _not_ lose your license for refusing field sobriety tests such as walking the line or touching your nose, but only for refusing a breath or blood test.

If you are or think you may be an alcoholic and want to do something about it, talk to a physician (I don't recommend AA as an initial contact). If you are using any quantity of drugs or alcohol, do not drive, but if you're dumb enough to think you can get away with it, STFU when stopped by police.

In PA, here's an idea of what to do if you get pulled over. I hear it on the radio all the time.

http://www.yorkdui.com/content/view/73/63/

If you refuse Field Tests police have nothing to base your level of intoxication and will most likely arrest you because all you need is probable cause to get blood drawn. If you take the test and pass you most likely will get let go. Do you believe police just arrest everyone who smells of alcohol? Law says if you are above .08% or incapable of safe driving you are DUI. If you only had 2 beers you won't be over. If you refuse to give blood after getting arrested you will lose your license for 1 yr regardless if you get convicted of the DUI.(CivilPendot matter). So if you you refuse, extra year suspension, as well as your DUI suspension and its harder to get ARD if your are a 1st time offender. By all means refuse to cooperate and make the case against you easier for the Commonwealth. Tell the families of the people killed on SR30 that drunks should go around check points or its just a sickness. Drunks hurt innocent people and sometimes kill them. Get a cab or a desiganated driver and who cares how many checkpoints are set up.

I hate these unconstitutional checkpoints.

I should go out there and obviously drive arround the checkpoints so the cops have to go chase me. I know a bunch of car guys who'd love to do that.

Slow down the whole works until people start thinking...hey...maybe this inconvenience and loss of constitutional rights isn't worth the marginal safety improvement. The supreme court let us down on this one.

Civil disobedience.

What constitutional right are you talking about Fatty?

Jeff Spangler wrote:

Driving around them will also get you stopped if cops see you approaching and turning around to avoid them. If you're even a tad impaired, refuse the field sobriety tests which no one ever passes and demand that they either arrest you or let you go. Also consider handing them a Notice of Rights (available on my website) with your cards and letting the Notice speak for you.

It was SARCASIM. If I was out drinking and driving, knowing that one of my friends was behind me, I would use my cell phone and let them know not use that route. Someone will do just what I described. I was being SARCASTIC the first time.

Well, Fatsean..whatever it takes to keep drunks off of the roads, then I'm all for it. Sadly, there were no checkpoints to stop this drunk loser from killing 3 innocent people. What really gets me is that more often times than not, the drunk not only escapes injury, but is a multiple DUI offender.

Despite these checkpoints, I still blame the system for not being even harder on drunk drivers. If I had my way, a 1st offense DUI would serve a mandatory 1 year in jail, 2nd offense 2 years and so on, no exceptions. When you are drunk and turn the ignition, your "rights" should vanish. What about the rights of those maimed by the selfish and sometimes deadly acts of a drunk driver?

If you want to drink, that's fine. Don't expect the rest of us to pay for it with your stupidity.

Gotta agree with Tom P... If your out and have had a "few" drinks it's not likely that your DUI. Things would go much easier if you go with the flow and end up with a ride home from a friend. But if you start knocking heads with the police along the road at 0waytooearly in the morning your gonna get jammed up. First of all they do this every night, they are not intimidated by your pretending to know the law. You have already committed an offense so they have the reason to show your impared. If you think your not, just do the sobriety tests or blow in the little machine. You can't hurt things from here, you might help yourself out. If you do ok, get that ride home from your ticked off wife. If they ask for a blood test and you like to drive, go for the ride. It may also come back under .08... The test refusal is a civil thing and not part of the DUI, even if you beat the DUI charge. Good luck with winning that. If you get into a checkpoint and you haven't been drinking, your on the way within a few seconds, oooh myyy what a violation of my rights to get a few family killers off the roads.

You should always refuse the breath test in York. Refuse the one-leg stand. Refuse the alphabet thing. In most cases, you should simply tell them to take you to the hospital for a blood test, unless it's your third offense or higher.

You can refuse everything except the chemical test (blood, breath, or urine, at the cop's discretion, and breath does not include the handheld preliminary breath test they ask you to do at the roadside) with NO consequences, criminal or civil.