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Although I do not condone drinking and driving, nor sleeping after drinking while sitting in the car, but this is a taking the Law a little to far.
Maybe the law is worded to include being in the proximity of a vehicle to be under penalty of a DWI. But to get a DWI, doesn't a person have to be driving? And how can the court prove that this man got drunk at a bar, walked to his car drove home and fell asleep in the car? He could have had a few drinks at home, walked to his car and fell passed out. Although most likely he drove home.
Court: Man drunk, asleep in car still guilty of DWI
Evidence that a person was alone, drunk and asleep behind the wheel of his working car with the keys on the center console is sufficient to support a drunken-driving conviction, the state Court of Appeals ruled today.
After a call from a concerned citizen, police found Daryl Fleck asleep in his car at 11:30 p.m. one night in an assigned spot at his apartment building, according to the ruling written by three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeals.
Fleck was "obviously intoxicated" and a test showed a blood alcohol concentration of .18 percent, she wrote.
"The keys to the vehicle were on the console between the driver and passenger seats, but there was no evidence Fleck had recently driven," the ruling said.
Fleck told officers he had come to sit in the car. He was charged with two counts of first-degree driving while impaired for being in physical control of a motor vehicle while drunk. He was convicted in Polk County District Court of both charges and sentenced to four years in prison. (He had prior convictions.)
Fleck argued that evidence that he was merely sleeping in his car at his home while he was drunk does not mean he was in "physical control of the vehicle."
The court disagreed, saying the conviction stands "because Fleck's keys were readily available to him, and there is no evidence ... that his purpose for being in the vehicle was inconsistent with driving."
--Rochelle Olson • 612-673-1747
Maybe the law is worded to include being in the proximity of a vehicle to be under penalty of a DWI. But to get a DWI, doesn't a person have to be driving? And how can the court prove that this man got drunk at a bar, walked to his car drove home and fell asleep in the car? He could have had a few drinks at home, walked to his car and fell passed out. Although most likely he drove home.
Court: Man drunk, asleep in car still guilty of DWI
Evidence that a person was alone, drunk and asleep behind the wheel of his working car with the keys on the center console is sufficient to support a drunken-driving conviction, the state Court of Appeals ruled today.
After a call from a concerned citizen, police found Daryl Fleck asleep in his car at 11:30 p.m. one night in an assigned spot at his apartment building, according to the ruling written by three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeals.
Fleck was "obviously intoxicated" and a test showed a blood alcohol concentration of .18 percent, she wrote.
"The keys to the vehicle were on the console between the driver and passenger seats, but there was no evidence Fleck had recently driven," the ruling said.
Fleck told officers he had come to sit in the car. He was charged with two counts of first-degree driving while impaired for being in physical control of a motor vehicle while drunk. He was convicted in Polk County District Court of both charges and sentenced to four years in prison. (He had prior convictions.)
Fleck argued that evidence that he was merely sleeping in his car at his home while he was drunk does not mean he was in "physical control of the vehicle."
The court disagreed, saying the conviction stands "because Fleck's keys were readily available to him, and there is no evidence ... that his purpose for being in the vehicle was inconsistent with driving."
--Rochelle Olson • 612-673-1747
I've confused myself, what were we talking about?
