This case involved the client being involved in a motor vehicle accident that he did not cause. Another driver ran a red light and struck the client's car. Law enforcement arrived on the scene and spoke to both parties. When speaking to the client, the officer noted that he smelled like alcohol and admitted to consuming 2 beers earlier in the evening. The officer had the client do field sobriety tests and arrested the client for OWI 2nd. The client provided a blood sample which indicated a test result of .18.
We thought that was illegal to have the client submit to field sobriety tests and challenged the unlawful detention.
The officer testified and through cross-examination, we were able to get the officer to indicate the reason for the field tests was the odor of alcohol. Well, that's not enough. The Court agreed with us that the officer lacked reasonable suspicion to conduct field sobriety tests and suppressed all the evidence. Fantastic win for the client.