I can’t understand why you make someone go through the ridiculous steps of balancing, touching your nose, etc, just breathalyse them and be done with it. Aren’t you as likely to imprison someone who has bad balance as a drink driver?
I can’t understand why you make someone go through the ridiculous steps of balancing, touching your nose, etc, just breathalyse them and be done with it. Aren’t you as likely to imprison someone who has bad balance as a drink driver?
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Sigh, this question yet again.
Learn to search.
Also, Breathalyzer doesn’t test for non-alcohol impairment and may not be admissable in court.
People can be impaired in other ways besides being drunk at the wheel.
If a guy just smoked two blunts and took a handful of benzos he’ll be able to pass a breathalyzer. You want the cops to just be like “he passed the test Jim, nothing we can do about it” before he goes off and causes a massive accident?
It’s crazy that nobody thought of this before.
The reality is drunk drivers rarely end up with jail time. The most significant punishment is usually the vastly increased insurance rates. This is something I believe most states need to treat as a far more serious crime than they do.
Regarding the core of your question, to bring charges against someone prosecutors want to be prepared to prove beyond a reasonable doubt they were drunk. If it goes to trial they need to convince a number of people to unanimously agree that standard has been met. That’s the standard to convict someone of a crime in America. It’s best to err on the side of gathering more evidence than was necessary.
It’s possible to be under the influence of substances other than alcohol. It’s also to establish the probable cause that allows them to legally compel a breathalyzer or other type of chemical test.
If they have a breathalyzer handy they will use it. And they’re also likely to get a blood test if they arrest you for suspicion of DUI/DWI. But you can get a DUI for non alcohol things as well so the field test can theoretically help if someone is say, on drugs or sleep deprived.
The field test with the balancing does have issues yes, which is why even if they arrest someone for failing they will follow it up if they’re half competent police.
Not a cop, but I’d guess that:
It gives the cop probable cause to breathylize the suspect and
If the cop has a body camera, it provides visual evidence that can counter arguments that the breathylizer is inaccurate, out of calibration, or improperly used.
That’s a field sobriety test. The reason is so that they can document reasons why they believe the person is under the influence and get probable cause for more definite tests to make sure.
Also, it’s usually procedural built up over decades to make it harder for people to weasel their way out of the charge because something was missed along the way.
> I can’t understand why you make someone go through the ridiculous steps of balancing, touching your nose, etc, just breathalyse them and be done with it.
Breathalyzer just helps with alcohol. There’s a ton of other substances that can cause impairment which can impact driving (marijuana, cocaine, heroin, meth, painkillers, hallucinogens, etc) which a breathalyzer isn’t going to help with.
> Aren’t you as likely to imprison someone who has bad balance as a drink driver?
No.
The battery of tests is to establish probable cause that someone is driving impaired. It’s not just balancing lol.
Police usually video the physical test so when the person tries to claim the breathalyzer was wrong in court they have backup evidence.