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With mandatory blood draws, is your county putting the Transportation Code statute making the withdrawal mandatory into the charge?

What about the Statutory Authorization form outlining that statute that the officer fills out? Admitting that form under the same premise as the DIC-24?
 
Posts: 22 | Location: San Antonio, Texas | Registered: March 17, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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What element of the offense does it prove?
 
Posts: 7860 | Location: Georgetown, Texas | Registered: January 25, 2001Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I don't see any reason for that to go into the charge. That's a legal issue on the admissibility of the evidence, not a question for the jury.
 
Posts: 1116 | Location: Waxahachie | Registered: December 09, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Defense trying for nullification. State shut down in voir dire when talking about legality of mandatory draws.
 
Posts: 22 | Location: San Antonio, Texas | Registered: March 17, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Why not ask the judge to take judicial notice of the mandatory draw statute during the presentation of evidence (I recognize it might be too late for that now) and provide a copy to the jury? If it is apparent early enough in the trial that the defense is going after nullification, let them have a copy of the statute.
 
Posts: 1089 | Location: UNT Dallas | Registered: June 29, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I'd cover this when questioning your officer (or whoever) about the blood draw. Ask the officer why blood was drawn, that it was pursuant to a mandatory law, and then have the judge take judicial notice of the law and get it in front of the jury. Then you can respond if the defense brings anything up in closing argument. It's still not a charge issue, and I'd be wary of putting it in there.
 
Posts: 1116 | Location: Waxahachie | Registered: December 09, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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If an Officer compels a blood draw, based on his reading of the NCIC/TCIC, which shows two prior DWI convictions, but later learns that one of the convictions was actually a Red: Obstruction charge with DWI conditions, is the blood that was taken suppressed? Or, does a good faith exception exist, similiar to that for officer's relying on a Magistrate's signature on a search warrant?
 
Posts: 2 | Location: Gavleston, TX, US | Registered: December 28, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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The statute was deliberately written to say the officer "possesses or receives reliable information from a credible source" as to criminal history. During discussions with legislators and testimony in committee hearings, the explanation assumed that a computerized criminal history would be "reliable information from a credible source."

Originally, the bill provided that the officer only needed information showing an arrest, rather than a conviction. Legislators wanted it to be information showing a "conviction".

So, you should be able to make a fair argument for admission of the blood sample as consistent with the law if the criminal history did in fact reflect, albeit incorrectly, a DWI conviction.

Of course, if the defendant never refused the request for a sample, you could simply go with consent (arising from the initial implied consent).

This is the problem with an exclusionary rule that goes beyond constitutional standards.
 
Posts: 7860 | Location: Georgetown, Texas | Registered: January 25, 2001Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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