Drunk Driving DUI Law

There’s a push for a new blood test law.  Desoto County leaders want lawmakers to allow paramedics to draw blood at the scene of a DUI accident. They think it will help convict more drunk drivers.

Tim Cutis, The Deputy Director for Desoto County Emergency Services says they’re pushing for this after seeing cases where hurt drunk drivers go to the hospital, then walk out before getting a blood test leading them to walk free of any charges. “We’ve been trying to get this corrected for several years.”

He says one law allows paramedics to draw blood for prosecution, but another one says they can’t, “And those guidelines say that we cannot draw blood except for diagnostic use by the lab at the hospital, so the laws conflict with one another.”

Even though police can already do it, he and other Desoto county leaders want the law changed to allow paramedics to take blood at the scene of a drunk driving accident.

North West Mississippi is the only area of the state that is affected by this because they don’t have a trauma center.

Curtis says when someone is seriously hurt in a drunk driving accident they have to cross state lines to transport patients to the Med.

He says it makes it harder to get blood samples, “An officer from Mississippi cannot mandate that a doctor or a nurse in Tennessee draw for use of prosecution.”

Attorney Jim Franks says in his 30 years of defending accused drunk drivers he’s never seen someone walk free because they didn’t have a blood test. And, he says every time a new law takes effect it’s another defense for him, “The smartest thing the legislature could do is leave the DUI law alone because the defenses are settled we know what we can do and what we can’t do… every time change creates a problem for law enforcement.”

Source: Fox News