Dennis Drue Pleads Guilty: A DWI Lawyer's Perspective

For those who are not familiar with this story,  23 year old Dennis Drue was accused of causing an accident on the Northway that took the lives of two local high school students.  And to make matters worse, he was accused of driving while his ability was impaired by the consumption of alcohol and marijuana. His horrible prior driving record was published in the papers, as well as his criminal convictions for marijuana possession. Today, people are celebrating his guilty plea to 58 charges.  And some are furious that the deal only calls for 5 to 15 years of prison. The death penalty would not even be good enough for some. In fact, some folks are time traveling in an attempt to keep Drue from ever existing, because they believe he is an evil monster. Such is the hysteria of DWI. 

Read the first sentence above again. He was accused of causing an accident. Whatever the cause, it was an accident.  Accidents happen whether one is sober, stoned, or drunk.  But if you drink and drive, or drive while you have cannabis in your system, you should know that you can’t drive safely right?  I say wrong, or at least I am not totally convinced.  And that is where I find the motivation to practice an area of law that for some folks, is evil.  It may be even the work of the devil. 

The fact is, for the witch hunter mentality types out there, anyone accused of drunk or drugged driving, must be guilty. And alcohol and drug related accident cases are especially evil for many folks. That is a reality that criminal defense lawyers have to face when trying DWI cases. And Dennis Drue most likely would never been able to get the right jury, due to the heavy media coverage in the Saratoga area, and our small population. A similarly heavily covered case would be the Porco murder. And he got a change of venue.

By the right jury, I mean finding a juror that truly understands, and has the capacity to embrace the concept of the presumption of innocence, or a juror that can wrap their head around the concept of reasonable doubt.  A juror not tainted by exposure to the Drue story.  I live, work, and breathe in Saratoga County and I don’t  know a single friend, neighbor, colleague, etc., that does not know about this case. These juror qualities are required by the Constitution. Drue move for a change of venue, and lost.   

Herein lies the biggest problem with DWI laws; and they become significantly more substantial in a case like Drue’s. We have yet to be able to figure out a system that proves, with reliable and scientific accuracy, at what point someone becomes an unsafe driver due to alcohol or drugs.  But, we have established levels at which a driver is assumed to be unsafe per se.  It does not matter who you are.  Regardless of your age, your health or, your level of tolerance. In NY and in most states, if you blow an .08  you are guilty.  It doesn’t matter that body temperature, certain ailments, mouth alcohol, machine calibration, etc., can drastically affect your BAC as determined by a breath or blood test machine. That number is the number. And even in the face of evidence of sobriety, if a jury believes in that number, the defendant is guilty.

 But we can’t let people get away with these alcohol or drugged driving crimes, so we make an (un)educated guess about what drunk or high is, and that guess is close enough.  Is close enough good for Dennis Drue, who was facing up to 25 years in prison if found guilty at trial?  Would close enough be good enough for your brother, your daughter, or your friend?  One of the reasons the Drue case has been sensational is because his BAC was less than .08%.  The magic number was not there.  He also had marijuana metabolites in his system, but we don’t know if they were metabolites that are actually psychoactive, or just remnants that actually have been proven to not cause any impairment or dysfunction. 

I don’t blame Drue for taking the deal. He had a great deal to lose.  But I am disappointed the trial is off.  My office is right down the street from the Courthouse in Saratoga and I was looking forward to observing.  Especially the expert witness testimony, because experts for the defense are so rare in DWI cases. And I assumed with Steve Coffey for the defense and everything, they would have the money to spend on real experts. Experts are common for the government though, they are called police officers.  In your average DWI trial, there is no requirement that the DA explain any of the science to the jury that assumptions are built upon. The cop is the straw man for science on the stand.  The court has taken judicial notice of the validity of Field Sobriety Testing and breath test technology because it is accurate beyond question, or at least, it is close enough for government work. 

I hope the families of the kids that died can find some kind of peace.