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Humourously your 'ability' to judge the passage of time is part of a field sobriety test in many parts of the US
by pacaro 6y ago
Humourously your 'ability' to judge the passage of time is part of a field sobriety test in many parts of the US
- wakawaka1 6y agoYep. Police Forces really need to reform these silly baseless psuedo-science ideas.
- pacaro 6y agoGiven that they end up with a breath test anyway, either there on at the station, and the field sobriety isn't typically admissible, I suspect that they do it for other reasons. It's either theatre to intimidate the suspect, or an excuse for overtime for the other 2-4 offices that show up
- tomjakubowski 6y agoI imagine it's fun for the officers to watch a drunk person try these things too.
- lotsofpulp 6y agoYes, they’ve already made up their mind about what they want to do, so once you’re suspected the testing is just a formality.
- AmericanChopper 6y ago> Given that they end up with a breath test anyway You might not have a lot of say in whether you’re taken in for a breath test, but that doesn’t make it admissible in court. A cop only needs reasonable suspicion to pull you over and ask if you’re drunk. A cop needs probable cause to arrest you for breath test. The purpose of the field sobriety test is to help with the probable cause part. It’s also worth noting that (in the US at least), you are never under any obligation to participate in one. Refusing one can’t be weighed against you as probable cause, and participating in one will never help you. Especially considering police will judge as sober field sobriety test participant as impaired about 50% of the time. Roadside breath tests are quite a different matter though. But they’re still used for the same purpose. The actual evidential test will be a blood/breath test performed after arrest.
- aaron695 6y agoIt's more than that. When it becomes just a breath test, next step is to set up road blocks and breath test everyone. We know because it happens in countries. The idea is human beings should be considered innocent by default and allowed to live their lives without being medically tested at random. Suspicion -> suspicion -> breath test -> blood test.
- taneq 6y agoDo you(/they if you're not from the US) not have breathalyzers?
- Fezzik 6y agoWe do in the US, but the general public (and jurors) can be skeptical of breathalyzers, no matter how accurate they are. So the police are forced to come up with ancillary evidence in case someone contests that they were drunk. As a law clerk I watched a jury find a guy not guilty of a DUII who blew a .18 on a properly calibrated breathalyzer because of a bunch of wonky arguments by his defense attorney about how the officer did not conduct other field sobriety tests. - At a .18 BAC you are drunk and on the brink of blacking out, unless you are a full-fledged alcoholic.
- taneq 6y agoWow, a .18 is pretty solidly drunk. In Australia you're fined for being over 0.05 and automatic 6 month loss of license for 0.08.
- Broken_Hippo 6y agoCops will use them if they suspect you are on other drugs or if they want to detain you longer, too.