3 Ways Great DUI Attorneys Use Experts in DUI Cases

The best DUI attorneys often work with the best DUI experts in their cases. In fact, the best experts will be able to give expert testimony on numerous issues related to a drunk driving case. Here are three ways DUI experts can be used to help your DUI lawyer win your case.

1. Delayed Absorption Defense: Perhaps one of the most important areas to use an expert is when you are using the delayed absorption defense in your DUI case. The basic premise of this defense is that the driver drinks alcohol and then is driving and stopped by an officer before the alcohol has been absorbed into his or her bloodstream. Then between the time of the stop and giving the breathalyzer, the driver's blood alcohol content continues to rise.

If this is the case in your situation, it may be possible that your blood alcohol level was lower than the legal limit at the time you were stopped by the officer and then rose above the legal limit before you took the breathalyzer. The best DUI attorneys will ask you questions to see if this defense may be a possibility and if it is they will hire an expert to determine whether or not this is a valid defense. If the expert determines that this is a valid defense in your case, he or she will be able to testify at trial. If the state's expert agrees with your expert, then the case could be dismissed before even going to trial.

2. Physiology Expert for Walk and turn Test: In the walk-and-turn test the officer may penalize you for pivoting incorrectly when you turn around. However, many people will actually pivot in such a way that requires more coordination than the pivot the test requires. At trial a good DUI lawyer will call an a physiology expert to testify that the type of pivot you used required more coordination than the pivot required by the test, and that therefore it is actually evidence that you are not impaired.

3. Expert on Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus Test: One of the standardized field sobriety tests is the Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus Test or HGN test. The HGN test is based upon the fact that a drunk driver's eyes will jerk slightly back and forth when they look 45 degrees or more to the side. If you fail the HGN test you may want to hire an expert to tell the jury that HGN can occur at a blood alcohol level of as little as .04 BAC.

The best experts are those that can testify to a variety of issues. So if you are using the delayed absorption defense, but you failed the HGN test and did the wrong pivot on the walk and turn test, you could hire one expert to testify that you were still not intoxicated at the time you were stopped by the police officer.