5 Years of "Super Drunk" Law

This fall marks the 5-year anniversary of the ‘super drunk’ law going into effect.

The law is officially known as operating while intoxicated with a high BAC, and imposes stiffer penalties on those caught driving with blood-alcohol levels above .17 percent. Intended to target the drunkest of drivers who are usually at fault in the most tragic of crashes, the law is the subject of a series on MLive exploring if it has helped to keep Michigan roads safer.

It’s difficult to say if a law is keeping roads safer or not. From MLive:

Alcohol-related crashed have gone down slightly across the state since implementation of the law…At the same time, the number of all drunken-driving tickets across the state is on a downward trend. One reason: there are fewer officers on the road due to budget cuts

The drop in alcohol-related crashes was 5%, from 9,845 total crashes in Michigan involving alcohol in 2011 to 9,396 total crashes in 2014. These total crashes include fatal crashes, which fell 12% from 253 in 2011 to 222 in 2014.

In addition to crashes, the total number of tickets is declining. In 2011, the first year of the law’s existence, police issued 11,998 “super drunk” driving tickets. That number has fallen about 16% to 10,116 tickets in 2014.

Both the number of crashes and tickets involving drunk drivers have been falling. Is this due to the ‘super drunk’ law?

Drunk driving itself is a complex issue to tackle, and lawmakers and law enforcement are both apt to acknowledge this fact. Michigan State Police spokesperson Tiffany Brown is quoted as saying in an email “I can tell you that in general, the state’s drunk driving laws, including the High BAC law, are one component of an anti-drunk driving strategy, which also includes enforcement and public education” (From MLive).

MLive has maintained a database of drunk driving arrest statistics since 2011, ranking all counties in Michigan according to the percentage of registered drivers who were arrested on high BAC charges. MLive also includes rankings of counties by percentage of registered drivers involved in alcohol-related crashes and alcohol-related fatal crashes.

According to MLive, “Most counties that rank in the top 10 in both 2011 and 2014 are not in any of the state’s major population centers. For instance, rural Gogebic County in the Upper Peninsula ranked number three in 2011 and number one in 2014 for ‘super drunk’ arrests”.

As officials are quick to point out, statistics often don’t tell the whole story. Just as the declining number of tickets is partly due to budget cuts; shifts in funding, road patrols and how many criminal complaints officers are responding to can affect the numbers.

An example of this can be Alger County, a rural area in the Upper Peninsula with a population of 9,480 with 6,924 registered drivers. The county had 16 high BAC drunk driving arrests in 2011, making it number 16 in the state for “super drunk” arrests. That number of arrests had dropped to eight by 2014, putting Alger County in 65th place.

Alger County Sheriff Robert Hughes gave a simple explanation to the drop in arrests: “We had some overtime grants. Now we’re back to [normal staffing]”.

According to Sheriff Hughes, Alger County received a grant for overtime patrol officers because of the number of crashes the county had been experiencing. The increased patrols amounted to more drunk driving tickets. This also led to a decrease in the number of crashes, which, in a twist of logic, meant that the county was no longer eligible for the grants.

Jackson County Sheriff Steven Rand agrees that it’s not wise to try and infer too much meaning from statistics. According to Rand, the numbers for his county have remained consistent, and he is unsure of how much direct impact the ‘super drunk’ law is having. Rand believes that drunken driving is such a complex issue that its really hard to curb it even with stiffer penalties. The Sheriff says that “you probably have something that’s beyond what criminal punishment can fix”.

Rand assumes that his experiences in Jackson County are similar to those in the rest of the state. He’s lost some deputies due to budget cuts and the jail is frequently overcrowded.

With fewer deputies patrolling the roads, not as many drunken-driving tickets get written. And with an overcrowded jail, a judge is more likely to opt for treatment over time served.

Nonetheless, Sheriff Rand likes the law. “I like the enhanced penalties of the super drunk law”, he says. “[These drivers are] dangerous. They are the people out on the roadways killing people”.

The amped-up penalties for driving with a BAC of .17 or higher include: up to 180 days in jail, increased from 93 days; fine of $200 but not more than $700, increased from $100 but not more than $500 and one-year license suspension, increased from six months.

Some penalties are the same for those convicted of regular drunk driving, such as 360 hours of community service, paying the cost of prosecution, six points on a person’s driving record and mandatory alcohol treatment.

The BAC levels for drunk driving have changed dramatically over the past 30 years. In Michigan, a driver used to need to be at .15 percent BAC to be convicted of drunk driving and .10 for impaired driving. That was subsequently lowered to .10 for drunk driving and .08 for impaired driving. Today, a driver can be convicted of drunken driving at .08 percent BAC and “super drunk” driving at .17.

Not everybody is a fan of this 5-year old law. Defense attorney Joe Simon doesn’t like that the punishments are more severe based solely on the blood alcohol content. Simon contends that another burden people face is that drunken-driving charges are not eligible for first-time offender programs. Additionally, drunken-driving convictions can never be expunged, while other more serious felonies can be wiped from a person’s record under the right circumstances.

Regardless of where officials and citizens stand on the law, there’s a growing consensus that for drunk driving, getting people the right treatment is more important than punishing them. Ann Arbor’s 15th District Court Judge Joe Burke says that he can only put people in jail for a certain amount of time and that when they get out, they’ll just start drinking again. And driving.

With most county jails already dealing with overcrowding, treatment programs are making more and more sense.

Burke runs Ann Arbor’s sober court, a special court for repeat offender who can’t seem to stop drinking. A person will be selected by the probation department to undergo the rigorous treatment, which mandates 90 days of daily alcohol testing and going to 12-step program meetings five to seven days a week.

The Michigan Supreme Court has studied these treatment courts and issued a report on is findings. According to Judge Burke, “It shows without a doubt that people who go through the treatment courts are far less likely to…commit another crime than people who haven’t been through it”.

Drunk driving is a serious issue that plagues Michigan roads, causing far too many accidents and deaths every year. It is a complex issue as well, and one that does not have any quick fixes.

Perhaps being issued a stiffer penalty will be a wake-up call for some who are inclined to drive after drinking, or the law may serve as a deterrent to encourage better decision-making.

It seems that the some of the best approaches to tackling the drunk driving issue are to have adequately-funded police departments capable of having enough deputies on the roads monitoring drivers and issuing tickets. For those arrested, treatment and rehabilitation is more effective than punishment. However, a differentiation of BAC levels is important because those who are driving “super drunk” are most often the ones involved in fatal crashes. Michigan’s High BAC law may not be perfect, and may not solve all issues related to drunk driving, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.