Sobriety Checkpoints: Stopping Drivers Without Probable Cause

Drivers arrested for DUI / DWI at sobriety checkpoints in California often ask why police are allowed to stop them without probable cause. The answer may come as a surprise - the courts have ruled that probable cause isn't needed when police operate sobriety checkpoints, as long as certain criteria are followed. However, police don't always follow those guidelines. An experienced DUI / DWI defense lawyer from The Kavinoky Law Firm will determine whether police followed established protocol while conducting a sobriety checkpoint.

Stopping a vehicle at a roadblock is considered a seizure for Fourth Amendment purposes. The Fourth Amendment states that individuals should be free from unreasonable searches and seizures of their person and their belongings. The key factor in Fourth Amendment issues is reasonableness. The officer must have reasonable suspicion that a crime has occurred, or the seizure must be carried out under a plan containing explicit, neutral limitations on the conduct of individual officers.

California's constitutional principles are based on the same issues. The government's interests is weighed against the intrusiveness of the detention to determine reasonableness. In California, there must be probable cause in order to justify an investigative stop or detention without a warrant. Probable cause means the officer must be aware of specific facts that some crime has or will take place, and the person stopped is somehow involved in that activity. Reasonableness requires that anyone else in the officer's position would have reached the same conclusion.

However, not every search and seizure requires a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Searches that are done to pursue an administrative purpose instead of as part of a criminal investigation may be permissible under the Fourth Amendment, even without probable cause. When evaluating an administrative screening, reasonableness is determined by balancing the public interest against the intrusion on the individual. Therefore, some types of roadblocks, such as sobriety checkpoints, are legal, while others are not.

Drunk driving roadblocks are considered to be part of a regulatory scheme with an administrative purpose, and not traditional criminal investigative stops. The primary purpose of a sobriety roadblock is to promote public safety by keeping drunk drivers off the road.

Therefore, if the appropriate guidelines have been followed, DUI checkpoints are legal and don't require probable cause. The guidelines are fairly straightforward - there must be a random formula - such as every third or fifth vehicle - which limits the discretion of the officers in deciding who to stop. The intrusiveness on individual drivers must be minimal. Each driver's detention must be brief, involving just a few brief questions that allow the officer to look for signs of intoxication. In addition, officers may shine their flashlights into the vehicle to look for alcoholic beverages. The Supreme Court has ruled that this intrusion on the individual is slight in comparison to the value to society in keeping drunk drivers off the road.

Drivers have also been arrested on suspicion of DUI / DWI after being stopped at other types of roadblocks unrelated to sobriety checkpoints. Some of these roadblocks are lawful, and some are not.

The Supreme Court has ruled that roadblocks whose primary purpose is to detect evidence of ordinary criminal activity are unconstitutional, and therefore illegal. Roadblocks designed to detect illegal drugs are one example. Illegal drugs aren't believed to pose the same vehicle-related threat to life and limb that exists with drunk driving. If police were allowed to stop drivers to check for every crime facing society, the constitutional protections we enjoy today would disappear. Therefore, because the primary purpose of a drug roadblock is to detect evidence of ordinary criminal wrongdoing, it is unconstitutional.

However, the Supreme Court has sanctioned roadblocks held to seek information and locate witnesses to a crime as being constitutional. Illinois v Lidster held that an Illinois roadblock did not violate the Fourth Amendment's prohibition of unreasonable search and seizure.

The roadblock challenged in the Lidster case was deemed reasonable because it advanced a grave public interest and only minimally interfered with Fourth Amendment rights. Police in this case were investigating a death by stopping drivers on the same stretch of road, at the same time that the accident occurred, asking motorists briefly whether they had witnessed the crime or had any information. Because the crime the officers were investigating was motorist-related, and the stop itself was brief, it was considered constitutional.

Some California DUI / DWI arrests that occur at roadblocks are valid, and some are not. A skilled California defense lawyer who focuses on drunk driving cases such as those at The Kavinoky Law Firm can determine whether the roadblock was properly conducted. If the roadblock wasn't conducted lawfully, any evidence collected likely will be suppressed in court.