Taimoor Rana is seasoned criminal defense attorney specializing in DUI related cases. He shares his expert legal opinion here « DUI and the Disappearing Right to a Jury Trial
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- Ok, so it has been said by the cop that I looked bad on the field sobriety tests, but I know myself that I’m not guilty: I only had two drinks and I have got the witnesses. It doesn’t matter what the arresting police officer is saying, I can tell my side of the story to my fellow citizens and then let them decide. Right?
Well that is not necessary. This right to jury trial, had been handed down centuries ago from England’s Magna Carta, it was considered so fundamental to the framers of our Constitution that it had been included by them in the Bill of Rights? This is what we call Sixth Amendment. So it makes no exceptions to this sacred right to trial by a jury of peers.
So why is this happening that some states today are denying jury trial to a person who is accused of drunk driving? Why is that, for instance, an American citizen who has been arrested in New Jersey is forced to accept the decision of a politically-appointed judge? After all, on that subject the Sixth Amendment is pretty clear:
“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed…”
How did it happened that the government has taken away this fundamental right from its citizens? Well, here once again if this question is asked by them they just started whittling away by playing around with words.
This has been started some years ago when it has been decided by the federal courts that the framers of the Constitution didn’t actually mean “in ALL criminal prosecutions”. So they changed one little word in that. So now it has been said by them that what the framers actually meant was that there was a right to jury trial in “serious” criminal prosecutions, not in “petty” ones. Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U.S. 145 (1968).
So Now there is a question that what is “serious”? Well, a couple of years after that change has been made, it has been decided by the Supreme Court that there was no right to a jury trial if the maximum authorized prison sentence did not exceed six months. Isn’t that amazing that a person that is going to jail for one-half year was not enough to justify giving a citizen a right to trial by his peers. And than the court further added that, however, a defendant could have a right to jury trial “only if he can demonstrate that any additional statutory penalties, viewed in conjunction with the maximum authorized period of incarceration, are so severe that they clearly reflect a legislative determination that the offense in question is a “serious” one”. Baldwin v. New York 399 U.S. 66 (1970).
Well, Now what about DUI cases? Usually they involve maximum sentences of six months in jail and a bunch of other allegations: These are fines, license suspensions, DUI schools, ignition interlock devices, 3-5 years of probation. And there is also a possibility that if the crime is repeated then even stiffer punishment can be given. Doesn’t that seems that knowing all these DUI consequences lawmakers should think drunk driving is pretty serious?
Inevitably, a citizen who has been accused of DUI and (inevitably) convicted by a judge in Nevada took the case up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Having all the additional punishment over and above the six months in jail, it has been argued by his attorney, that wasn’t it “serious” enough to get a right to a jury? The court replied in negative and it had been stated by the court that considering the additional statutory penalties as well, it is not believed by them that the Nevada Legislature has clearly indicated that DUI is a “serious” offense. Blanton v City of North Las Vegas 489 U.S. 538 (1989).
So now drunk driving looks like “serious” enough offense to justify ever-harsher DUI laws because of the oft-mentioned “carnage on the highways” but apparently they are not “serious” enough in the eyes of Law makers to give a citizen his constitutional right to a jury trial.
So now we have passed a long way since those historical words “In all criminal prosecutions…”
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3 commentsto “DUI and the Disappearing Right to a Jury Trial”
The bottom line is, it is a corrupt system that rests on the shoulders of the monied. You have to get a state legislator in your back pocket and work from that angel. Who’s going to do that?
Exactly. No one. And they count on it.
My brother is a dui lawyer. My other brother is in prison in Florida for killing a woman while drunk driving. Hes doing 20 yrs and im torn. On one hand i feel horrible for the woman and her family. Just imagine. And then my brother….his life is over too. Hes 34, when he gets out he’ll be something like 48 yrs old. Felony manslaughter record and what kind of social skills??? I don’t see the solution. But I see the problems. I wish they would have given him a chance. Instead of two lives gone maybe my brother could have been given 2 yrs and a suspended sentence with a serious drug program. Our family is just as miserable as hers.