Benavides Law Group recently secured another grand jury no-bill, this time in a felony DWI Third or More case involving a man in his 60s who maintained from the beginning that he had not been drinking.
Months later, the blood evidence confirmed exactly what he had been telling police.
A Traffic Stop Turns Into a Felony DWI Investigation
The case began when law enforcement stopped our client for allegedly failing to maintain a single lane.
Our client explained that he was tired. He also told officers that he had not consumed alcohol.
But after officers checked his history and discovered two prior DWI cases, the nature of the encounter quickly changed. Because a third DWI can be prosecuted as a felony in Texas, what began as a traffic stop became a serious DWI investigation.
Our client continued to deny drinking.
He also truthfully disclosed that he had taken prescription medication. But the medications he reported taking were not the type that would explain intoxication or an inability to safely operate a vehicle.
Nevertheless, officers continued their investigation.
Age and Physical Performance Are Not Proof of Intoxication
Our client was in his 60s and had difficulty performing the standardized field sobriety tests.
That presented an important issue.
Field sobriety testing requires a person to perform physical and divided-attention tasks on the side of the road, often under stressful and unfamiliar circumstances. Poor performance does not automatically establish that alcohol or drugs caused the difficulty.
In this case, our client maintained that he had not been drinking and did not admit to consuming an intoxicating substance.
Despite his explanations, he was arrested for felony DWI.
Then the Blood Results Came Back
Our client consented to a blood draw, and his blood was submitted for laboratory testing.
Then we waited.
Months later, the results arrived.
No alcohol. No drugs.
The objective forensic evidence supported what our client had been saying from the beginning: there was no alcohol or drug detected in his blood to substantiate the theory that his driving or physical performance was the result of intoxication.
An Arrest Is Not Proof of Guilt
This case is an important reminder of something that can easily be forgotten:
Completely innocent people can be arrested.
Police officers must often make decisions based on the information available to them at the time. But an officer's suspicion, even when it results in an arrest, is not the same thing as scientific proof, and it certainly is not a conviction.
Here, officers saw driving they considered suspicious. They learned about our client's prior DWI history. They observed an older man who had difficulty performing roadside sobriety exercises. They heard that he had taken prescription medication.
Those circumstances may have caused the officers to suspect DWI.
The blood evidence told a different story.
The Grand Jury Refused to Indict
The case was ultimately presented to a grand jury.
After the evidence was reviewed, the grand jury returned a NO-BILL, declining to indict our client for felony DWI.
That was an extremely important result. A DWI Third accusation is not simply another misdemeanor DWI case, it exposes a person to a felony prosecution and potentially life-changing consequences.
In this case, the accusation never became an indictment.
Why DWI Cases Require a Complete Investigation
DWI cases should never be evaluated solely by reading the arresting officer's report.
Driving behavior can have innocent explanations. Physical limitations can affect field sobriety testing. Age, fatigue, medical conditions, medications, roadway conditions, and countless other factors can influence what an officer observes.
And when blood or breath evidence exists, the actual scientific results matter.
Our job as criminal defense attorneys is to examine all of the evidence, not simply accept the conclusion reached on the side of the road.
Here, the laboratory evidence ultimately confirmed what our client had maintained all along.
Result: Felony DWI Third or More - NO-BILLED by the Grand Jury. No indictment.
Protect. Your. Future.
Every case is different, and past results do not guarantee future outcomes.