Facts: Officers reported to the scene of an alleged altercation between a male and female. One of the officers made contact with the female who he saw was driving a blue Mazda 4 door vehicle. She was backing the vehicle out of a parking space as the officers arrived on scene. The Defendant opened the door immediately and started screaming and cursing at the officer before he even introduced himself or explain why they were there. The Defendant stated she was looking for a phone battery and wanted him to “leave her the f@** alone.” The officer noticed the defendant had red/bloodshot eyes, slightly slurred speech and an odor of alcohol coming from her breath. The Defendant’s boyfriend stated that the Defendant was driving in an out of control manner going more than twice the speed limit, swerving in and out of traffic and casing him to fear for his safety. He was finally able to convince her to pull over and let him drive but she then threatened to leap out of the car if he kept driving. They pulled over again and she got back into the driver seat where she was seen by officers attempting to leave. The Defendant’s boyfriend told the officers that the Defendant consumed several glasses of wine prior to driving and that she had some hard liquor. He gave a sworn statement to that effect. The Defendant was asked to perform roadsides which she hesitantly agreed to do. She answered every questioned posed by the officer by saying “I have a medical condition for that.” After performing poorly on the exercises, the Defendant was taken back to the jail where she gave a breath sample of .120 and .116. The Firm filed a motion to suppress arguing that the Defendant was misadvised when she was requested to submit to the breath test and therefore coerced into giving her breath samples. The State of Florida agreed to the motion and agreed to exclude the breath. Subsequently, because of the loss of that evidence, the State agreed to drop the charge for Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol.
DUI & Criminal Division
