Driving Under The Influence of Alcohol – NOT GUILTY OF ALL CHARGES AFTER JURY TRIAL

The Chicago Police department received a call that an individual was passed out behind the wheel of a vehicle on a side street in Chicago. When officers arrived, my client was passed out in his vehicle with the keys in the ignition and the motor running. The officer woke my client and removed him from the vehicle. My client was so intoxicated that he could not speak properly or stand without assistance from the officer. When trying to perform the field sobriety tests, the officer had to keep my client from falling down. The problem for our case was that this was all  recorded with video and audio from the officer’s in-squad car camera system. This was my clients second DUI so I had to win. Instead of doing a trial in front of a judge, I convinced my client to do a jury trial since it was the only possible way to win. During the trial I argued that even though it was obvious that my client was drunk, he was not “operating a motor vehicle” since the officer never observed him driving the vehicle. I argued that just sitting in a vehicle with the motor running did not amount to “driving.” After two (2) days of trial, the jury came back with a decision within 45 minutes. NOT GUILTY OF ALL CHARGES!