If you are arrested for DUI charges you face very serious consequences including jail time and significant financial costs including fines in excess of $1000, increase in insurance premiums, probation, ignition interlock device, DUI school, and impound costs.
You also face loss of your driving privileges, which occurs almost immediately after a DUI arrest. If you refuse to submit to tests administered by the officer at the time of your arrest or fail the test by registering a blood alcohol level over 0.8, your license will be suspended 10 days following your DUI arrest. This type of suspension is an administrative suspension by the Department of Motor Vehicles. This means you have very little time to arrange alternate means of transportation including getting to work or your children to school.
A DUI Attorney can help you protect your driving privileges. A qualified DUI lawyer can file for a formal review hearing with the local bureau of administrative review. Formal review hearings will typically be held 3-4 weeks after a DUI arrest. A DUI attorney can get you a temporary permit so that you can continue driving in the interim period. Even if you do not prevail in your criminal case and your license is eventually suspended, your DUI attorney can help you gain valuable time to make alternate transportation arrangements.
Once you have been arrested for driving under the influence, it is important to retain an experienced DUI attorney quickly so that the DUI attorney can make a timely request for a formal review hearing. The DUI attorney also can use the DMV hearing to prepare a defense in your criminal case. Prior to the DMV hearing, your DUI attorney will get police reports, affidavits, and other documents related to your criminal case. If your DUI attorney finds upon review of the documents that the officer made an error, the attorney may choose not to subpoena the officer and use the error in the documents to get your full driving privileges reinstated.
If the officer shows up at the hearing, your DUI lawyer will use the hearing to get information from the officer, which can help him build a defense in your criminal case. On the other hand, the officer may fail to appear allowing your DUI attorney to request the DMV reinstate your unrestricted driver’s license. “Many times those arrested for DUI needlessly have their driver’s license suspended,” he said. “People just do not realize that the immediate suspension of one’s driver’s license is not the inevitable result of a DUI arrest.”