Taimoor Rana is seasoned criminal defense attorney specializing in DUI related cases. He shares his expert legal opinion here « DUI Sobriety Checkpoints: Are they Unconstitutional?
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- It is clearly said by the Constitution of the United States that the police can not just stop someone and they are not allowed to conduct an investigation unless there are “articulable facts” that are indicating possible criminal activity.
So here there is a question that how can they do exactly that with DUI roadblocks? so it is a good question. And this question was raised in the case of Michigan v. Sitz (496 U.S. 444), in which a decision of the Michigan Supreme Court striking down drunk driving roadblocks as unconstitutional had been reviewed by The U.S. Supreme Court. In a 6-3 decision, the Michigan court was reversed by the Court, holding that roadblocks were consitutionally permissible. Chief Justice Rehnquist started his majority opinion by accepting that DUI roadblocks i.e. “sobriety checkpoints” do, in reality, constitute a “seizure” which is within the language of the 4th Amendment. Explaining this in other words, yes, it’s an intentional violation of the Constitution.
Despite of everything it is only a little one, and there’s all this “carnage” on the highways MADD urge us that now we’ve got to do something about. It had been written by him that the “minimal intrusion on individual liberties” must be “weighed” against the need for and effectiveness of roadblocks.
It has been pointed out by the dissenting justices that the exceptions are not made by the constitution: The only question here is that whether the police had probable cause to stop the individual driver. As written by Justice Brennan that stopping every car might make it quite easy to prevent drunken driving…is an insufficient justification for leaving the requirement of individualized suspicion. Brennan concluded by noting down his statement as, today the most disturbing aspect of the Court’s decision is that it seems that it gives no weight to the citizen’s interest in freedom from suspicionless investigatory seizures.
The justification provided by Rehnquist’s for ignoring the Constitution rested on the assumption that DUI roadblocks were necessary and that they were effective. Are they really effective and necessary? As written by Justice Stevens in his own opinion, the statistics on DUI sobriety checkpoints/roadblocks have already been reviewed by the Michigan court, the findings of the trial court, which was based on an extensive record and that was also affirmed by the Michigan Court of Appeals, indicate that the net effect of sobriety checkpoints on traffic safety is extremely small and possibly negative. This opinion of Justice Stevens shows his strong disagreement.
The case was then sent back to the Michigan Supreme Court so that they may change its decision accordingly. But the Michigan Supreme Court avoided Rehnquist decision by holding that DUI checkpoints, although they are permissible under the U.S. Constitution, but they were not permissible under the Michigan State Constitution, and then they ruled again in favor of the defendant in effect Michigan Supreme Court said to Rehnquist that if they won’t protect their citizens then they will protect them”. Since then the State of Washington has followed Michigan.
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2 commentsto “DUI Sobriety Checkpoints: Are they Unconstitutional?”
Great post & so true! DUI checkpoints are an obvious violation of the US Constitution. Too bad that the SCOTUS is often the strongest defender of unconstitutional practices.