Posted by duijim in on November 13, 2023
Most individuals arrested for DUI in Atlanta do not know their best legal options for defense, and winning such cases requires special training and expertise.
There are various strategies available to Georgia residents looking to fight and dismiss a DUI charge, depending on the specific details surrounding their arrest. You can get a free online review of your arrest details now to determine whether case winning strategies apply in your case.
1. Take a Deep Breath
As stressful as DUI arrest can be, one great way to manage emotions and remain calm is taking deep breaths. You don’t need any special equipment – just breathe deeply from your abdomen into your nose for one or more deep breaths until they all come out. Practice will help you do this quickly but eventually it can reduce stress levels dramatically.
DUI cases begin when law enforcement believes your blood alcohol concentration (BAC) exceeds the legal limit of 0.08 percent. At that point, they will ask you to take field sobriety tests or blood samples; if either fail, or refuse, arrest for DUI will follow and you’ll be taken directly to police headquarters.
Fulton County State Court may take weeks or months before accepting your case from Fulton Municipal Court, depending on how many cases there are at both locations. Meanwhile, witnesses could lose contact with you; you might move jobs; new laws could even go into effect that impact on your case.
At your arraignment, both the prosecutor and defense attorney will engage in an intense race to discover evidence proving either your guilt or innocence of any crime charged against you. Therefore, always plead not guilty at your arraignment to avoid such an exhausting process.
2. Stay Focused
Arrest for DUI can be an emotionally draining and psychologically taxing experience. With criminal charges and potential penalties potentially impacting your daily life, it’s essential that you remain focused on what matters most in this case: your freedom.
Avoid excessive self-blame. DUI arrests often have their source in underlying factors that you can work to change, such as addiction or mental health conditions that contributed to this incident. Seeking professional guidance such as from counselors or therapists may help identify these problems and lead to positive changes in your life.
Make every attempt to stay as organized as possible during this stressful time, given your full schedule of community service appointments, financial obligations and transportation arrangements. Also try eating well and exercising regularly – this will help stabilize moods, improve sleep patterns and minimize the amount of stress felt.
At this stage, it is also imperative that you seek advice from an experienced DUI lawyer as soon as possible. A skilled legal professional will be able to explain your charges, answer any queries that arise and create an effective defense strategy against them.
Be mindful that any license suspension must be appealed immediately, with thirty days from your arrest date available for doing so.
3. Ask for Help
While DUI experience can be extremely traumatizing and stressful, there are steps you can take to ease it. Consulting a mental health professional often leads to therapeutic approaches like psychodynamic or cognitive behavioral therapy which help identify factors which led to your arrest in the first place and lessening future incidents of DUIs.
An additional helpful step would be seeking the assistance of a legal expert to give yourself the best legal defense possible against your charges. DUI law is highly complex, so seeking professional guidance for defending yourself alone would often be futile – much like trying to operate on yourself during open heart surgery!
An alcohol related driving under the influence (DUI) conviction on your record can have severe repercussions, from making it hard to find work or housing to hindering college applications or qualifying for financial aid. Furthermore, Georgia requires any person convicted of DUI to install an ignition interlock device on their vehicle as punishment.
An effective DUI defense begins by scrutinizing and challenging the evidence presented against you. An experienced defense lawyer can review every detail of your arrest to see if there was any mishandling by law enforcement when administering or processing breath or blood tests used as evidence against you.
If you have been charged with an Atlanta DUI offense, contact us immediately online or at our local number to speak with an experienced lawyer regarding your case. It is vital that we review it quickly to avoid missing deadlines for filing administrative reviews of license hearings and criminal court cases.
4. Ask for a Lawyer
An Atlanta DUI defense lawyer can not only assist in fighting your criminal case in court, but they will also defend you against administrative license suspension proceedings. It is often necessary to fight both charges simultaneously in order to maintain your driving privileges – so finding one early is key in keeping your license.
First, your lawyer will gather all the evidence in your case, such as video from officers and police reports as well as blood or breath test results. They will examine these documents closely in search of issues such as whether an officer had reasonable grounds to suspect you were driving under the influence or violated your constitutional rights; should any issues arise they can argue that your blood or breath sample was inaccurate and should not be admitted as evidence against you in court proceedings.
Police officers examining those suspected of DUI will ask them to perform field sobriety tests, such as horizontal gaze nystagmus, walk and turn, and one-leg stand tests. While most DUI tests take place at the scene itself, sometimes they may take place later at a station house or hospital. Most Georgia drivers must also submit to chemical testing; however you have the option to refuse; in that event an officer will issue you with a DDS 1205 form which effectively suspends your driver’s license for 30 days.
A qualified DUI attorney can file an administrative hearing to stop this suspension and secure you a temporary 30-day driving permit from the Department of Driver Services. They’ll also help set a date for your arraignment – where a judge will read out formal charges against you and let you enter a plea – at which point it is possible for them to negotiate on your behalf with any subsequent judges who might impose suspensions and sanctions against your license.
5. Ask for a Plea Bargain
An offense for driving under the influence (DUI) carries serious repercussions that will haunt you throughout your life, from fines and jail time to reduced employment opportunities and permanent marking on your criminal record. Because a DUI attorney will represent your interests when facing these challenges, hiring one is imperative to your future wellbeing.
Once your lawyer has reviewed your case, they can assess if plea bargaining is the best solution for you. Doing so could save money on fees while preventing harsher penalties from being assessed against you.
Your attorney may be able to use a plea bargain agreement as part of a plea deal to reduce your charges from felonious to misdemeanor, which would have significant ramifications on future Georgia criminal prosecutions, since misdemeanor convictions do not carry as severe collateral consequences than felonious convictions, such as restrictions on voting rights, housing options or employment opportunities.
Your Atlanta DUI lawyer may also have the ability to challenge evidence against you. They could show, for instance, that police had no reasonable suspicion to pull you over and that numeric breathalyzer results from hand preliminary breath test devices are inadmissible in court because they fail to meet certain standards for approved forensic devices.
Plea bargain decisions depend on individual circumstances and criminal histories, making a decision more personal than ever before. You can always opt to go to trial against your DUI charge but your odds of victory would likely decrease substantially than by accepting an offered plea deal from the prosecutor in your case.