Utah DUI Attorney

DWI and drunken driving are common words in our day by day speech, which should tell us something about the extent and familiarity of this growing problem. Utah dui lawyer will tell you that the term drunk driving has many official names including, DWI (Driving While Intoxicated), DUII (Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicants), OMVI (Operating Motor Vehicle Intoxicated), and OUI (Operation Under the Influence), and other acronyms OWI, DUIL, DWUI. These web pages primarily use the expression, DUI (Driving under the Influence).

Certainly, hiring a good Salt Lake City dui attorney is absolutely your best decision and ought to be your first move. DUI is a serious infraction with extremely complex consequences for everyone involved including drivers, victims, and general population. Each year in the United States an estimated half million people are injured in DUI-related highway crashes, costing taxpayers over 114 billion dollars.

The public offender may face the immediate loss of driving privileges, fines, house arrest, local incarceration, and prison time, due to drunken driving accusations. While Salt Lake City dui lawyerhave made headway in actual court cases, the number of drunken driving arrests have steadily climbed. Your Salt Lake City dui attorney should be expertly familiar with all the intricacies and nuances involved with DUI offenses. This index of lawyers will take you through them step by step, explaining testing, sentencing, jury trends, offer information, etc.

Utah dui lawyer have long been disturbed by the ease with which officers are able obtain blood samples from citizens suspected of driving under the influence; not because they believe that drunk drivers should be allowed to do as they wish, but because they believe strongly in the protections provided to us by the Constitution.

For those who are unable to open the link, the Missouri House of Representatives has passed a law which would allow officers to extract blood, without a warrant, from any person they suspect of driving under the influence. They know that the people behind this legislation do not necessarily mean to strip us of our constitutional rights, and they are sympathetic to their aims to a certain degree.

Originally published here.

The rise of cell phone and mobile device use in cars has led to a new category of driving danger: distracted driving. Distracted driving has become one of the most common causes of automobile accidents in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Per the CDC, 16 people are killed and over 1,300 are injured every day due to a distracted driving accident.

Recent studies by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Automobile Association of America (AAA) indicate that distracted drivers pose as much of a danger to other motorists as do drunk drivers:

Driving while using a cell phone slows down a person’s reaction time just as much as having a blood alcohol level of 0.08 (the legal limit in the United States), according to a study conducted by the University of Utah.
Driving while distracted is a factor in at least 25 percent of all auto accidents, and drivers that use cell phones are four times more likely to get into a crash that will cause serious injury, notes the NHTSA.

Given these statistics, then, it is curious why laws against distracted driving have been slow to develop and do not offer nearly the deterrent that laws against drunk driving do.

Past Attempts at Distracted Driving Legislation

Several states have instituted laws banning cellular phone usage including text messaging and hands-free equipment usage. Currently, the only bans on cell phone usage in the state of Arizona are for school bus drivers; the city of Phoenix also bans texting while driving, but it is not a statewide law.

According to the website drivinglaws.org, several bills have been discussed by the Arizona Legislature in the last two years. Five separate bills were introduced into the House in the 2009 and 2010 sessions, but none have passed.  These bills included proposals that would regulate text messaging, use of mobile phones for reading and sending emails, general cell phone use behind the wheel and other common driving distractions.

Common Driving Distractions

As the current debate on distracted driving continues, additional legislative attempts will likely be made to regulate common distractions, such as:

Handheld cell phone use. The most common type of cell phone distraction is talking on a handheld cell phone. According to the NHTSA, 500,000 drivers talk on handheld cell phones every day. Talking on handheld cell phones forces drivers to take at least one hand off the wheel and also take their eyes off the road while dialing.
Sending and receiving electronic messages. In the past few years, text messaging and e-mail have become more common on cell phones. Text messaging and e-mailing while driving are possibly even more dangerous than talking on a cell phone, as drivers must take their eyes off the road for longer periods of time.
Hands-free cell phones use. Many drivers believe that using a hands-free device for their cell phone, such as a Bluetooth, is safer than using a handheld cell phone. However, according to a study by the American Automotive Association (AAA), hands-free devices still contribute to inattention.

Until local, state, and federal governments decide to get hard on distracted driving just like they have drunk driving, distracted driving will continue to be a serious problem that can lead to serious injuries and even death.

Originally published here.