Medina DUI Defense Lawyer

In any criminal case involving driving under the influence, or DUI, the state prosecutor must satisfy their legal burden of proof to obtain a conviction against you. Moreover, the state must fulfill this legal burden beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a very high legal standard to meet.

If the prosecutor fails to prove even one legal element of their case, the court may dismiss your criminal DUI charge. To help poke holes in the prosecutor’s case, we can assert a robust legal defense on your behalf. A defense might work to negate one or more legal elements of the charge, resulting in a judge dismissing your case.

If you decide to take your case to a bench or jury trial, we can raise one or more legal defenses on your behalf and argue for a case dismissal. Taking a case to trial is sometimes the better option – especially if you have a robust legal defense. This is a decision we help clients make on a case-by-case basis.

Alternatively, we can secure a favorable plea deal from the state prosecutor on your behalf. In a plea deal arrangement, the accused individual – or the defendant – typically pleads guilty to a criminal charge.

However, the prosecutor typically makes one or more concessions in exchange for this guilty plea.

For example, in a DUI/OVI case, the prosecutor might be willing to reduce the charge from a felony down to a misdemeanor, or they might allow the defendant to plead guilty to reckless driving rather than DUI. Alternatively, in exchange for a guilty plea, the prosecutor might agree to probation. If the accused successfully completes their probationary requirements, then any conviction on their record may go away.

In some situations, it makes sense to accept a plea deal from the state prosecutor, while at other times, you may have a better chance of success by taking your case to trial. As part of a plea deal, a defendant gives up certain constitutional and legal rights, including their right of appeal and their constitutional right to a jury trial.

Our legal team can help you make intelligent and informed decisions in your case, including whether or not to accept a pending plea deal from the state prosecutor or take your case to trial in court.

A police officer can arrest a driver for DUI/OVI if the driver operates their vehicle under the illegal influence of alcohol or drugs. To determine the amount of alcohol in a driver’s bloodstream, a police officer will typically use a portable breathalyzer device to test the driver’s blood alcohol concentration or BAC. Drivers who are at least 21 years old must not have a BAC of 0.08 percent or higher. Otherwise, they are legally intoxicated.

More stringent legal standards apply to drivers who are under 21 years old, as well as commercial vehicle operators like tractor-trailer drivers. For individuals who are under 21 years old, the BAC cut-off is 0.02 percent. In other words, a zero-tolerance policy applies to these individuals. However, for commercial vehicle operators, the BAC cut-off is 0.04 percent.

If a police officer arrests you for DUI, you may be unsure what to do, say, and, more importantly, what not to say after your arrest. You must contact a knowledgeable DUI defense attorney in Medina as quickly as possible.

At Patituce & Associates, LLC, we can attend all police questioning with you. We can also meet with you to discuss the circumstances of your arrest and determine your eligibility for various legal defenses.

If the state prosecutor handling your case can secure a conviction against you after satisfying their legal burden of proof, then a sentencing judge must impose various penalties under state statutes. The penalties that you receive will depend on your BAC at the time the police officer arrested you, as well as your prior history of DUI convictions, if any.

Some of the most common penalties that a DUI offender may incur include:

• Monetary fines of between a few hundred dollars up to a maximum of $10,000
• Jail time lasting a few days up to 30 months
• Restricted license plates and immobilization of your vehicle, along with additional penalties if you operate your vehicle anyway
• Loss of your driving privileges and driver’s license, lasting from a few months up through the rest of your life, in some circumstances
• Mandatory installation of an ignition interlock device on your vehicle
• Required participation in a drug or alcohol treatment program for which you must pay

An ignition interlock device (IID) is a breathalyzer machine that some offending drivers must pay to have installed on their vehicle. For the driver to drive, they must blow into this device. If the device detects alcohol, it will not allow their vehicle to start.

In addition to paying for the initial installation costs of an IID, a driver must also pay for ongoing maintenance and monitoring of the device.

If you ultimately sustain a conviction on your DUI/OVI charge, the Medina DUI defense attorneys at Patituce & Associates, LLC can help. We can attend your sentencing hearing and argue for the lowest possible penalty on your behalf.

In addition to the potential legal penalties of a DUI conviction, a conviction may also result in various collateral consequences that affect your overall life and well-being.

First, if you have a DUI conviction on your record, you may have difficulty finding or keeping a job. This is especially true if your job requires maintaining a driver’s license.

In addition, you may have difficulty gaining admission to an educational institution, such as a college or university. Admissions officers frequently perform criminal background checks on college applicants. They may deny your application if they uncover a DUI conviction on your record.

Moreover, a current college or university student may lose financial aid or scholarships after a criminal DUI conviction.

Finally, DUI offenders may experience harm to their personal or professional reputations in the community.

Our skilled legal team can work to lessen or eliminate the collateral consequences that you experience due to your criminal DUI/OVI conviction.

An individual arrested on a DUI charge can raise one or more legal defenses at their criminal court trial. If the defense is successful, the DUI charge may be subject to a complete dismissal.

First, an individual accused of DUI can raise Fourth Amendment violations as a legal defense to their charge. For example, the driver might be in a position to argue that the responding police officer did not have the necessary reasonable suspicion or probable cause to pull their vehicle over in the first place. In that instance, any subsequent DUI arrest might have been unlawful.

Next, an accused individual can contend that the breathalyzer equipment the police officer used was faulty in some way. The officer might not have properly calibrated the breathalyzer machine, or they might have made a mistake when administering the test. Additionally, a driver can argue that the police officer did not properly administer chemical testing, such as blood or urine tests. A toxicology expert can also conclude that certain chemical testing evidence is faulty.

Next, a driver can argue that the responding police officer made a mistake when they administered one or more field sobriety tests.

For example, the officer might not have conducted the test correctly or failed to account for faulty lighting conditions – or an adverse medical condition from which the driver suffered. If the driver suffered from a balance condition, that condition may have prevented them from accurately completing their field sobriety test.

Our legal team can help you determine if you can raise one or more of these defenses. If so, we can argue the proper defense in court on your behalf. We gather strong evidence to support each client’s individual defense strategy, and our legal team provides personalized and tailored defense assistance in every DUI case. Allow us to begin building your defense today.