--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hey guys, i just wanted to share some good news with you. On Wednesday, I did my summation on my 6 day jury trial for a guy with his fourth Driving While Intoxicated charge. First one was knocked down to an "Impaired" second one was misdemeanor guilty plea with 3 years probation and the last one was a felony plea of guilt with 5 years probation. This one started as a felony, but was "knocked down" due to a (and I quote) "Complete Lack of Evidence."

Well, after putting 4 police officers on the stand (1 Sgt from 5th precinct, 1 Sgt from Communications, 1 PO from Emergency Services Unit and my arresting PO from the 5th Precinct) I rested. When proving a DWI, you first have to prove "Operation" of the car. Since the defendant had fled the scene of his accident, that was hard to prove. I basically had the Sgt who had seen the defendant walking away. Ok, so then when ESU found him, he had the keys to the car and the car was registered to him, so my circumstantial evidence got me through the operation part....

Next was that he was intoxicated. Since this guy is a PRO drunk driver, he knew that by being as disruptive and combative as possible, the police wouldn't be able to conduct field sobriety tests and since he'd already fled the scene, they wouldn't allow him to be uncuffed to perform them. When they started reading him rights to an Intoxilizer 5000 test, he screamed and cursed so much that they DIDN'T finish reading him his rights. THAT WAS BAD. Basically, he would have REFUSED to take his DWI test and we could use that refusal as a consciousness of guilt in presenting it to the jury.

Ok, so I couldn't use his refusal in court, since he didn't actually get read his rights, I used my officers observations of his intoxication. (Ie. Bloodshot and glassy eyes, slurred speech, unsteady on his feet and stunk like a drunk.) It also didn't hurt that he didn't even make it out of the parking lot of the bar he was drinking at, when he ran over a 5 foot retaining wall and got his truck stuck. Can you believe this guy?

Anyway, I did my summation and the jury was nodding their heads the whole time in agreement. When I sat down, I knew I'd given not only the speech of my life, but the performance of my life!

12 minutes later, the jury came back with guilty verdicts on all charges!

I've now been granted rock star status at work.

Drive safe, there are real assclowns out there.

PS. Sentencing is in February.

 

Good stuff man! Would amputating this guys legs be considered cruel and unusual punishment?

 

Awesome! Too bad it has to be so difficult to punish criminals.

 

hahaha..... wow, where was this?