drink driving - have they used the right protocol?

[tracim]

my brother was arrested for suspected drink driving - police arrived at his house approximately 30 minutes after he arrived home one evening and woke him up from his sleep (approx 1am) they said his car had been found 'crashed' and abandoned and an apparent witness had seen him leave the car and asked if he was ok and was told to leave him alone. The police quizzed his wife who was completely bewildered and none the wiser - my brother has no recollection from leaving his friends house to arriving home. The police arrested him and cuffed him, but didn't breathalyse him until part way on the way to the police station which is approximately 45 minutes away. They pulled up and did the breathalyser. They had the car recovered immediately which is strange considering it was early hours of the morning, and they didn't disclose where it was. They said there was blood and saliva on the airbags but there wasn't a mark on my brother or any sight of blood on his face/clothes/hands etc. Is it protocol to arrest someone without breathalysing them? They have said they had a witness and blood/saliva on the airbags but have released him and will let him know in 4 weeks if they are charging him. When they left his house at 1am his wife went to drive around the village to look for his car - the police came back at 3am and when she questioned him advised her that it had already been recovered by then - he left his friends to walk home at 10.50 and got home at 11.40, and the police arrived at midnight. it all just seems a bit strange. When the police came back at 3am they advised my sister in law that they had put a statement together about the questions they had asked her when they arrived - where had he been, did he have a drink when he came in, was there a spare key etc - and asked her to sign it - is this the usual format to take a statement?

 

[SeanJoyceStephensons]

A specimen on a hand held device before arriving at the police station is merely an indicator to the officers to justify taking someone to the police station to obtain a specimen on the evidential machine at the station. They cannot charge on the basis of the result on the way to the station.

The police need to establish the basic ingredients of the offence before a charge is authorised, namely evidence that your brother:

1. Drove vehicle;
2. In a public place;
3. Whilst over the prescribed limit

If they can refer to evidence that suggests he drove the vehicle and if they have an evidential specimen of breath over the legal limit then they will charge. It is presumed in law that the amount of alcohol in a persons breath at the time of the specimen being taken at the station is the amount at the relevant time of driving. That presumption can be overcome if the defence can establish that alcohol was consumed in the intervening period and that, were it nit for that 'post-incident consumption' of alcohol, that person would have been under the limit at the time of driving. The police will likely have been attempting to obtain evidence to be used to argue against any suggestion your brother may make as part of a defence; i.e. that he consumed alcohol after driving and before being arrested.

 

[tracim]

thank you.