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Thursday, May 28, 2015
By Michael Nichols
Categories: Michael J. Nichols
The latest trend among law enforcement is to coerce a breath sample from arrested citizens who are faced with the choice of giving prosecutors evidence or losing the driving privileges that are critical to many of us. It is time for a paradigm shift: persuading judges that the Supreme Court of the United States insists that a breath test or a blood test that is obtained through consent come only as the result of knowing, voluntary and fully direct consent.
A recent case involving an IT executive from the Mid-Michigan area is an example of Mike Nichols using cutting edge legal strategies to make evidence of guilt disappear when the police overstep their bounds and coerce consent from the arrested subject. A Judge at the 55th Disttict Court recently suppressed a .09/.08 breath test when he found that the breath test was the product of coercion from the arrestee on the part of the arresting officer. "This was the 4th time a judge ruled that a prosecutor could not use a police officer's evidence unless the officer followed the rules to a 't' in using the implied consent act to obtain a breath sample," said Michigan-DUI attorney Mike Nichols
The implied consent act is at MCL 257.625a. Nichols says: "prosecutors like for people to believe that when you signed up for a driver license, you agreed to give a chemical test," says Nichols The implied consent act, however, requires that a police officer tell an arrested citizen that they still have the right to refuse a test and if you do, it will not be given without a court order. Nichols says "since the McNeely v Missouri case, courts have been required to analyze the consent of the driver to a chemical test on an independent case by case basis. In a situation, like this recent case, the driver has been misinformed that a warrant is inevitable, then the ability of a driver to make a truly informed decision is an illusion."
The lawyers at the Nichols Law Firm have been fighting on the cutting edge to protect the rights of all of us one client at a time. For the lawyers who are committed to results, contact the Nichols Law Firm at 517.432.9000.