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Woman charged with drunk driving two times in three hours

On Behalf of | Nov 11, 2014 | DWI |

It may be reasonably argued that zombies should not be allowed to drive. Over the Halloween season, however, that rule is widely and jovially flouted. Police arrested a woman dressed and made-up as a zombie in upstate New York at 2 a.m. on Oct. 25. She was pulled over and charged with drunk driving after being spotted driving without headlights.

She said she had been attending a Halloween party. The Rochester native was picked up at the Montgomery County police station by a friend and driven home. She then apparently took off the zombie apparatus and proceeded to get in her car and drive again.

She was arrested a second time, less than three hours later, by police who allegedly saw her swerving on a roadway. Police said that she has a history of other drunk driving violations, beginning in 2006. It is unknown what testing the police did to determine that there was probable cause for an arrest in each instance. Police are bound to give field coordination testing and to take the blood alcohol reading. Beyond that, their personal observations also go into making a probable cause determination.

One basic premise in the law of DUI is that the more violations one has, the stiffer will be the potential sentence. If the charges in this case prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, the defendant will be facing a significantly larger sentence than a first offender. That is because she has a history of prior offenses.

In New York, if there are three prior offenses (convictions) for drunk driving in the past five years, the defendant faces a jail sentence that can go as high as seven years. For a second conviction, a jail sentence can go up to four years maximum. The defendant’s chances for a fair sentence will be maximized by consulting quickly with an experienced DUI attorney, and following the attorney’s recommendations for engaging in rehabilitation therapies. That is perhaps one of the strongest strategies, which shows that the individual is making a good faith effort to change her potentially dangerous ways.  

Source: New York Daily News, “Woman arrested twice for DWI in 3 hours, once while in zombie makeup“, Lee Moran, Oct. 29, 2014

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