Pennsylvania DUI Penalties in 2026: License Suspension, Jail Time, ARD and Ignition Interlock

00:00:18:05 – 00:00:47:28
Unknown
if you get a DUI, what are you looking at when it comes to suspension? When it comes to mandatory jail time, when it comes to the ignition interlock device, there’s been a lot of changes in recent days, even months we’ve had recently where the law has changed. And this has we’ve gotten a lot of questions from clients and even just from the general public about what is coming down the pipe when you get charged with a DUI or get pulled over for a DUI.

00:00:48:00 – 00:01:11:24
Unknown
So we’d like today to give you guys some pretty direct updates on that. We’ve done prior episodes here on Now we defend regarding how to handle traffic stops. Regarding DUIs. I would kind of caveat you to check those out if you’re interested. We those were actually pretty successful episodes where I think there was a lot of information imparted upon you about how to handle yourself and that stuff you got to know in the moment.

00:01:11:28 – 00:01:30:25
Unknown
So it would really be a good idea to check those out. This is the type of stuff of what comes after. When you actually are stopped, you’re released, you’re charged, etc. and I do want to before going into this, there’s a lot of technical information here. We’re going to try to unpack individually, but I want to just plug here.

00:01:30:28 – 00:01:51:20
Unknown
It is so important that you reach out to a lawyer before you even get charged. If you get pulled over for a DUI and you know it’s coming down the pipe. So let’s say you gave blood and you’re waiting on your blood result to come back. It can take a month or two to even get your blood result back, and you’re sitting around wasting time.

00:01:51:23 – 00:02:09:29
Unknown
If you do not reach out to an attorney, I cannot tell you how many people call me or Tim or Justin after they get their charges. And they the incident happened two, three months ago. And I say, why didn’t you reach out to us earlier? And they say, oh, well, I talked to some other lawyer and they told me not to do anything just to wait till I got my charges.

00:02:10:01 – 00:02:28:02
Unknown
Bad advice, that is, do not stick your head in the sand. All you’re doing there is you’re hiding and you’re not engaging, and that is going to come back to bite you in the. But later when you’re trying to fix your case down the road. So please, if you are under suspicion of the UI and you think it’s coming down the pipe, talk to us as soon as possible.

00:02:28:05 – 00:02:47:12
Unknown
I literally sometimes have clients call me the day of the DUI, the day after the Dewey, and we get them in, we get them started, and the timing of when they begin what they should be doing is so, so vitally important to the ultimate outcome later that it literally saves cases. Sometimes it is that important. So please heed that warning.

00:02:47:17 – 00:03:11:00
Unknown
Please reach out if you find yourself in a situation when the DUI even before you’re charged. Okay, so that said guys, let me start with generally just what tiers of DUI exist in Pennsylvania. There are three tiers of DUI. But there’s multiple types of substances that you can be under suspicion for DUI for. So we have tier one, tier two, tier three.

00:03:11:02 – 00:03:43:22
Unknown
Tier one is a DUI that has just alcohol. And it is the basic level that comes back on the blood result is between 0.08, the legal limit. And we’ve talked about the legal limit in prior episodes and 0.099% if you have just alcohol in your system. Between those levels, you are a tier one DUI. I would say out of all the DUIs I see, and this is just a general statistic across this law firm, but that is definitely the minority of cases that we see.

00:03:43:24 – 00:04:04:19
Unknown
Not a lot of people are coming in at the very lowest legal limit. You can also be a tier one D UI if you refused the blood test. But that also, as we’ve said in prior episodes, comes with a mandatory and automatic immediate one year driver’s license suspension if you refuse the blood test. So we do not advise you to do that.

00:04:04:22 – 00:04:22:26
Unknown
There is also a caveat to that. If you refuse the blood test and then the police go out and get a search warrant for your blood, then you actually and you refuse that, that aggregates to then a tier three DUI. So that’s automatically the highest tier. So that’s tier one just alcohol. We’re not talking about any drug involvement yet.

00:04:22:29 – 00:04:47:06
Unknown
Tier two do you lie is if your back is between a 0.1 and a .15 9% just alcohol. Or you could be lowest tier, but have had a vehicle accident that also puts you into tier two automatically, even if your blood alcohol is not in that level. There are some other kind of oddball ways you can end up in a tier two that I’m not going to go into too much right now, because it’s pretty rare.

00:04:47:08 – 00:05:13:22
Unknown
And then you have tier three, tier three DUIs. If you have just alcohol, 0.16% or higher, if you have any combination or level of alcohol, plus any drug, even prescriptions and even marijuana that counts. But this could be anything from heroin to fentanyl to cocaine to any drug prescriptions or otherwise, even if they’re prescribed to you. And we’ve talked about that previously, and I think we’ll unpack that today to a little bit.

00:05:13:24 – 00:05:32:14
Unknown
And, if you have just drugs in your system that makes you a tier three. And then again, guys, I said it earlier, if you refuse the blood test and the police get a warrant, a search warrant to take your blood, and you refuse to comply with that, you are also now a tier three DUI automatically with tier three penalties applied.

00:05:32:17 – 00:05:54:08
Unknown
Additionally, at least in York County, and I think pretty close to your county and even surrounding counties, if that in that scenario, you’re also going to get charged with the crime of obstruction of administration of law or obstruction of justice, which is a separate crime that gets added on top of you and creates other issues. So again, guys, all the more reason we do not advise in refusing a blood test.

00:05:54:08 – 00:06:12:22
Unknown
There’s only very limited time. I would even consider advising that. And that would be a multi offender DUI who is only under suspicion for alcohol. Then you might want to consider doing that if they don’t get a warrant. But the moment they get the warrant and you refuse you gigs up, then you’re then you’re going to be a tier three DUI anyway.

00:06:12:22 – 00:06:30:14
Unknown
So consider that. So all right guys I’m going to punch it over to you first. Justin here I want you to we’re going to start kind of going order guys. We’re going to we’re going to start with tier one okay. So we explained what that was. Tier one I want to talk about suspensions for tier one. I want to talk about interlock for tier one a little bit.

00:06:30:16 – 00:06:53:11
Unknown
And we are going to unpack interlock generally in a little bit after we go through all of this. But just generally what the requirements are. And when you’re eligible for that as a tier one DUI or do you even get suspended, right. Yes. So so for first offense DUI tier one, there is no mandatory license suspension. So license isn’t going to be suspended.

00:06:53:13 – 00:07:14:08
Unknown
You’ll be able to keep that. And there is no mandatory interlock based solely on that conviction. Right. Obviously there’s not interlock because there’s no suspension to begin with. Right. But to keep in mind here at tier one, you might if you I’m going to talk about if you refuse. So let’s say you refuse and they do not get a warrant.

00:07:14:08 – 00:07:33:16
Unknown
I said earlier, guys, that that makes you a tier one do you I okay. They usually only do that meaning not get a warrant on a first offense DUI. Yes. Where you refuse if the second or subsequent DUI. At least in York County. Guys, there is a protocol and you guys both know this. Yes, there is a protocol that the police are getting a warrant and they’re going to execute that warrant.

00:07:33:16 – 00:07:51:14
Unknown
And I’ll tell you, I’ve only seen a few different occasions where a judge isn’t signing that warrant. I’ll actually explain that because I actually had a judge ask me about that, a warrant that he was presented with recently that I want to talk about a little. But in that scenario, if you refused, yeah, great. You’re at tier one, but you still just got suspended for a year.

00:07:51:19 – 00:08:20:12
Unknown
Yes. Because you refused. And that still is applicable even though you don’t get suspended additionally on the tier one. Yeah. And we see that. Yeah. I wouldn’t say that frequently overall. Obviously, as we talked about in prior episodes, any refusal is going to result in a life suspension. So if your, a tier one, or I shouldn’t say tier one if you refuse a first offense, especially here in New York County, like you said, they usually don’t get a warrant.

00:08:20:12 – 00:08:37:11
Unknown
And if they only suspecting you of alcohol, that’s going to put you in that tier one. But again, with that refusal, it’s a 12 month license suspension automatically. You really can’t fight that. You can file a license suspension appeal. And I’ve done that in cases I’ve never won one. Because the burdens a little bit lower. Right.

00:08:37:12 – 00:08:59:10
Unknown
And just to your credit, Justin, and for everybody out there, it’s not because you’re a bad lawyer and you can’t win a license suspension. And I just want to be clear with you guys. We get this question a lot. Like, yeah, license suspension appeals are almost always not winnable. And it’s because you literally for a refusal, you almost have to be medically unconscious when they’re requesting you to give blood.

00:08:59:14 – 00:09:16:17
Unknown
There’s some case law about this that clarifies that. But if they’re asking you to give blood and you go to them and you’re like, I don’t understand, let me read that more, I want to get my lawyer. If you pretty much and we’ve said this in our other episode, anything other than an unequivocal consent, right. If you’re beating around the bush with him, you’re wasting time.

00:09:16:17 – 00:09:37:19
Unknown
You’re asking questions, you’re wanting a lawyer. These types of things are going to cause them to be a refusal. Yeah, okay. You don’t have to say no. You can just be not consenting. And that that can be considered a refusal. And again, we’ve talked about how police officers sometimes will try to kind of coax you a little bit and be like, listen, we’re you have to understand how serious this is.

00:09:37:20 – 00:09:53:23
Unknown
Like, you’re going to get your license suspended and they might try to help you through it. But at the end of the day, if you’re not given like that’s a refusal. Yeah. And I like I said, I had one case this is years ago out in Lebanon County where, I had filed a license appeal where a guy refused on a first offense.

00:09:53:23 – 00:10:16:12
Unknown
And again, it was a tier one because the refusal, and basically to win a license suspension appeal on the refusal, you you basically have to prove to the court that the officer didn’t even have probable cause to ask you to submit to the blood draw. And that one, I thought was actually that was the closest I’ve ever felt that I actually have an argument here.

00:10:16:14 – 00:10:41:25
Unknown
But, yeah, I mean, they’re they’re next to impossible to win because again, if, if, if you refuse in any way, there’s really not much you can do at that point. One thing that you are eligible for is you are immediately eligible to get the interlock, which will, I’m sure, break down. But, so I think if you’re I think there might be a I could be wrong about this, but I’m pretty sure on a refusal you have to wait six months.

00:10:41:25 – 00:11:01:16
Unknown
You’re right. I’m sorry. Okay. So. Yeah, that was bad. Just to be correct on this guy’s on a refusal. License suspension for a period of 12 months. As Justin said, it is not immediate eligibility. You do have to wait six months to be. It’s a full blackout for six months, you’re suspended, and then you can apply for your interlock early.

00:11:01:18 – 00:11:20:07
Unknown
That’s your early eligibility point. When you do get it on, you have to have it on for one year from when you get it on. So it’s not just the remaining six months. You have to have interlock. You have to have it on for the entire next year from when you get it on. But again, as you were, I think kind of thinking about there was it’s early eligibility.

00:11:20:08 – 00:11:39:28
Unknown
Yes. Yeah. That that that was my bad there. Yeah. But yeah I mean, if you’re going to refuse, you know, expect that suspension to come and you can even beat the DUI. Oh, yeah. You know. Yeah. And I’ve seen that happen. Yeah. I’m both as a prosecutor and a defense attorney where, you know, either I’ve lost in a, you know, a bench trial on a tier one.

00:11:39:28 – 00:12:00:10
Unknown
That was a refusal. And then I’ve also, you know, one on tier ones that were refusals on the defense side. And, whether or not you ultimately deal with the actual DUI criminal charge, you’re still getting that suspension. Yeah, I love that point. That’s a that’s a such a great point. I’ll give you an example. I, and I think I might have said this in a prior episode at some point.

00:12:00:12 – 00:12:16:17
Unknown
I tried a jury trial for a it was ended up being a, it was a third offense DUI refusal. And the guy was in a vehicle accident and we we won a trial. He was found not guilty, but he refused the blood test. Originally he got suspended for that and he still had to do the whole suspension.

00:12:16:18 – 00:12:31:17
Unknown
Yeah. Even though he wasn’t convicted, that’s 18 months. I believe that one was in 18 months because it was a multi serve refusal, nine months of the suspension before you’re eligible. Yeah. But that is a great point. I mean that’s a question we get a lot like oh well if I, if I beat the DUI doesn’t my suspension go away.

00:12:31:19 – 00:12:50:23
Unknown
No no it doesn’t. You’re still getting that. So it’s a pretty it’s a pretty heavy lift if that hits you. So that’s why you guys need to know you know. Absolutely. There was one other thing I wanted to point out here. And this is in a first offense tier one refusal where they do not get a warrant and you apply for the a r d program.

00:12:50:24 – 00:13:15:22
Unknown
Yes. The a, the a r d program will suspend you for 60 days if you get accepted into ar.d. And this is actually a point that comes up a lot. And I’ve had a few cases where because if you plead guilty to it or you get convicted of it first offense tier one, you do not get a license suspension for that additional to the suspension you got for the refusal.

00:13:15:24 – 00:13:46:20
Unknown
That’s a conviction, though. If you get A or D and you refused and your tier one and you got that first year, you get an additional 60 days. And this is in the statute actually for getting ARD. So that is the one downside to getting a ARD and a tier one first offense refusal, because you get that extra 60 days that you wouldn’t get if you just went and pled guilty or worked out a deal or got convicted, you would still have that year for the initial refusal, but you wouldn’t get the extra 60 days.

00:13:46:23 – 00:14:06:11
Unknown
But again, the trade off there guys is now you got a criminal conviction that’s on your record for good. And ARD avoids all that and also avoids any, you know, potential sentence you could get which although it’s not mandatory could be jail time would probably be probation. But you know you’re really saving your future there for a 60 day extra suspension.

00:14:06:13 – 00:14:28:24
Unknown
And for that one you are immediately eligible for interlock for that 60 days. So if you’ve already gotten your interlock early at the six month mark for the refusal for the underlying, suspension you got because you refused, you can just roll right into that 60 day period and keeping your interlock. So and with interlock we’re going to talk about this.

00:14:28:24 – 00:14:49:16
Unknown
But we hear it. Our law firm we have some relationships with these interlock vendors. And I promise you they are not all created equal. Some of them are awful. And I’m not going to go into naming them because we kind of reserve that when we have clients. But it’s really important to be lined up with the right interlock companies, because those interlocks can mess your vehicle up.

00:14:49:18 – 00:15:07:20
Unknown
They all cost different. They’re actually different devices from different companies. So it’s important to be lined up correctly on that and know when you can get it back. All right. Enough of me and you Justin, for a little bit. Tim, I’m going to go over to you. And guys, just so you know, Tim’s not feeling great today, but he came into work and, he’s he’s rocking and he’s at full steam.

00:15:07:20 – 00:15:27:19
Unknown
But you know, he’s he’s feeling a little under the weather. But I’m going to go to Tim for tier two. Pop over to you, Tim. Oh, there he is. So. All right. What are we talking about? All right. Second of, Sorry. First offense. Tier two. Just kind of generally what it looks like. Okay. And, like, from a suspension standpoint, interlock and all that.

00:15:27:19 – 00:15:51:26
Unknown
So it’s it’s 12 months, just like the, what you guys were talking about with, like, refusals. And if I’m not mistaken, its immediate eligibility for the ignition interlock for a first offense tier two d UI. Yeah. Because again, you’re getting a 12 month suspension because this is not a refusal. This is one where. Oh, I guess you could have if it was an accident, you could have a refusal with an accident without a warrant.

00:15:51:26 – 00:16:14:03
Unknown
Without a warrant. Tier two. Yeah. That’s kind of a rare one. But yeah, usually tier two is your back between 0.10.159. And like you astutely said, 12 months suspension. And as you also said, immediate eligibility for interlock. That’s a big one. Yeah. And the interlock period is one year. With, with the immediate eligibility. And that is that interlock period.

00:16:14:03 – 00:16:34:06
Unknown
It’s something I think that we kind of talked about are you alluded to with the refusal is the waiting period there. The interlock period will not start technically right away. Like after you get a DUI. It starts when you’re convicted. So that’s something to keep in mind. I know we’ve talked about this at like the highway safety school classes and stuff.

00:16:34:06 – 00:17:01:29
Unknown
What is the timing for actually getting that device in your car so that you don’t have an interruption in your driving ability, and the device itself needs to be installed before you actually get the interlock license. So if you know, I’m going to be resolving my case on this date, we we know that PennDOT takes about 60 days to send you the suspension notice, and the suspension is not even going to be effective on the day you get the paper.

00:17:02:00 – 00:17:16:11
Unknown
Yeah. And I don’t think it’s it’s not 60 days to get the notice within 60 days that they will suspend you. Right. But usually you get the notice which is a letter from PennDOT. Guys. That’s all it is. Piece of paper in the mail. So you better have your address up to date. But basically you’re going to get that.

00:17:16:11 – 00:17:32:11
Unknown
I always tell my clients about within about two weeks of the disposition. So if you plead guilty, get sentenced, you’re going to get a letter probably within about two weeks. Right. And that letter is going to tell you the date in the future that your actual suspension will begin. That’s about 60 days out. Yeah. From when you pled.

00:17:32:11 – 00:17:52:18
Unknown
I’ve seen some cases recently where the notice takes maybe 3 or 4 weeks to get out. Yeah. PennDOT slow guys. We tell people typically, or at least the court I’ve heard tell people that you should receive notice of the suspension within 60 days. At the very least, you should get the paper within 60 days, and then that suspension will likely take effect.

00:17:52:18 – 00:18:11:28
Unknown
It’ll be shortly after you. It’ll be dated shortly after the date of the letter. So this is another weird thing to keep in mind is that when you get your letter from PennDOT, the letter is going to. They understand that it takes some time for the letter to get to you. So there’s the there’s a there’s the letter date.

00:18:12:00 – 00:18:38:08
Unknown
And then there’s also a mailing date, I think, on the letter. And the time to appeal the license to spiel is keyed off of the mailing date, the day they say they mailed the letter. You have 30 days from that date to submit your appeal to PennDOT if you want to appeal it. And, and so, you know, you’re going to have this period where you resolve your case and then you’re looking at a license suspension at the future there.

00:18:38:10 – 00:18:56:11
Unknown
That window is usually the time where you want to make sure you have everything put together for the interlock, so that there is no interruption in your ability to operate your vehicle. Yeah, yeah. Tim, that stuff that you just talked about is really, really important. So I’m going to also kind of hammer that home. This stuff with PennDOT.

00:18:56:12 – 00:19:33:06
Unknown
We get so many people who call us after the fact because they did not talk to somebody about their PennDOT implications. As an a lawyer, for all your lawyers out there, please talk to your clients about their PennDOT implications. You need to understand guys. They are for all the clients and defendants out there, a PennDOT implication, a license suspension points, all that stuff is indirect that that means that you don’t go to court and the judge sentences you to your license suspension, you don’t go to court, and your lawyer negotiates what your suspension is with the D.A. and the judge adopts it.

00:19:33:11 – 00:19:57:02
Unknown
This is all written in statute law. This is non-negotiable stuff. This is automatically indirect consequences of convictions or of refusals of the blood test lawyers out there. You need to talk to your clients about this. I do not like cleaning up messes from lawyers that didn’t talk to their clients about indirect consequences. And there’s plenty out there that do it and do it really well.

00:19:57:05 – 00:20:15:24
Unknown
But I get so many calls from people who weren’t represented by our law firm on a DUI, and they’re asking me all these license suspension questions, and I’m like, who represented you in your DUI case? Did they not talk to you about this stuff? And they’re like, no, I never they never said anything about it. That is just to me, that’s bad lawyering.

00:20:15:24 – 00:20:34:18
Unknown
And I just I can’t stress that enough. Like, please talk to your clients about that. It is just as important, if not sometimes more important to the client what is going to happen to their driver’s license, then what is going to happen to them when they get sentenced, or whether they’re going to be able to stay out of jail or get probation or whatever.

00:20:34:22 – 00:20:57:13
Unknown
So it is literally the one of the most important things that we should be talking to our clients about. And I do want to reiterate kind of what Tim was saying. The way this works, guys, is you do not know what you’re sentencing hearing unless your lawyer is telling you what your suspension impact is going to be, because, again, it’s not something we’re working into.

00:20:57:13 – 00:21:16:22
Unknown
Your plea deal now in York County, we do sign forms with our clients at sentencing. Yeah. Which specifically say, hey, you know, you are getting a license suspension, but I don’t know about you guys, but all the forms that I’ve ever signed, none of them say how long it is. No. Yeah. No no, no. They don’t say how long, but I just noticed that you’re getting suspended.

00:21:16:25 – 00:21:35:10
Unknown
And then, you know, to be fair to other attorneys, and I know I’ve been in this position before recently with clients where they’re looking at pleading to some offenses that all kind of carry suspensions. So you’ve got some stacking of suspensions. And as lawyers, we got to know that stuff. Like we have to tell our clients, I have multiple offenses with different suspensions that are stacking.

00:21:35:11 – 00:21:55:28
Unknown
And I’ll tell you, I would tell people that and I and in this case, I had that conversation with the client and I, I told the client that it was unclear to me if they would be immediately eligible for the interlock. Yeah. And I said, you know, depending on how this is calculated, you might be I don’t know the answer to that, but you should be aware that it’s going to be one of two things.

00:21:55:28 – 00:22:17:17
Unknown
Either you’re going to be immediately eligible for it, which is what I think should be the case, or there is going to be a brief window of suspension that they’re going to attribute to something else, and then they’ll give you the interlock. Right. Well, and the other thing too, that was a muddy case, because there was there was a refusal that I don’t think was being was being applied.

00:22:17:19 – 00:22:39:02
Unknown
So like that was the other thing is like on paper, this person really shouldn’t be immediately eligible. But because there’s no refusal suspension, they they might be immediately eligible. So I mean, it was kind of a mess from the PennDOT side of things. So in that case, I mean, I just had to tell the client, like, these are all the different options that PennDOT has.

00:22:39:02 – 00:22:55:17
Unknown
We don’t know if PennDOT made a mistake and if they’re going to fix that mistake, or we don’t know if this was by design, that maybe the DL 26 was never submitted. We don’t know any of that. So you’re going to have to look and see what PennDOT says when they send you that that suspension letter. You’re going to have to look and see.

00:22:55:17 – 00:23:11:24
Unknown
Because here’s I think the total amount of suspension you’re looking at. And I think you’re going to be eligible for the interlock at this time. But they may come back and say you have to serve X number of months before you can get it. Yeah. Sometimes that’s the best you can do because this stuff gets to be a mess really quick.

00:23:11:25 – 00:23:43:20
Unknown
Yeah. And I think just kind of dealt with something like this a little bit recently. It wasn’t a case that I was initially involved in, but, you know, this person had a number of different suspensions, including DUI suspensions, driving under suspension, DUI related suspensions, but then also regular driving under suspension suspensions. And how that was structured by PennDOT in the restoration letter was basically every non DUI suspension was applied first.

00:23:43:23 – 00:24:17:02
Unknown
Yeah. And then the DUI suspensions were applied. So if there you have somebody who’s pleading to, you know say like a fleeing and a DUI, they’re going to get a suspension for the fleeing and the DUI. And I think the way that PennDOT does it and I could be wrong on this, but I’m just going to assume, based on the fact that, you know, you don’t need an interlock for the fleeing, but you need it for the DUI that they’re going to do the it’s also a shorter suspension is that aren’t interlock related or required first.

00:24:17:05 – 00:24:41:18
Unknown
But I’ve, I, I saw a guy at a highway safety school. He showed me his restoration letter and it was a strange restoration letter. He had a bunch of driving under suspensions and it did. It was very hard to tell from looking at the letter what suspensions were running and when the ignition interlock began, because they’re all kind of layered together and and as we’ve said before, that sometimes those letters are not very easy to understand.

00:24:41:20 – 00:25:01:13
Unknown
So like I agree with you, especially after the case that I saw just recently, I’m generally going to tell people, especially from this point on, that the non DUI stuff seems to come first. But this case that I saw with that guy, that wasn’t totally true. Even if it doesn’t, though, I think what you need to look for is that eligibility date that they have on there.

00:25:01:14 – 00:25:24:14
Unknown
Because that was yeah. What there were a couple intertwined suspensions like a regular does DUI does, then another regular one. But the eligibility date wasn’t until essentially the last suspension was over. Over. Yeah. So I think that could be something to even if they’re kind of intertwined and mixed up in the sense of it’s not all non DUI suspensions.

00:25:24:14 – 00:25:45:19
Unknown
First you got to look to that eligibility date. That’s probably your best guide as to when you would be eligible to apply for the interlock. And I think you can apply 30 days prior to that. So yeah, yeah. And not only can you, you should be applying 30 days prior to when you’re eligible to get interlock because it again, we call it slow PennDOT.

00:25:45:19 – 00:26:13:08
Unknown
It’s going to take them about 30 days to process that that interlock application. And I want to get more into that. But I also want to talk about what we’re talking about here, which is the interplay with all of these other suspensions that people get. And you guys were pretty spot on with this. Like they if you have multiple suspensions, guys, they’re going to make you most of the time serve those suspensions in full before they make you eligible for for the interlock on a DUI suspension.

00:26:13:11 – 00:26:34:20
Unknown
Because think about the absurd result that would happen if they had you serve the DUI suspension. First put the interlock on the vehicle, take the interlock out of the vehicle. Be completely suspended again afterwards before you could even restore your regular license. That’s just ludicrous. And it wouldn’t happen. But to Tim’s point, PennDOT done weirder things like those letters that you’re talking about.

00:26:34:20 – 00:26:54:14
Unknown
Tim, restoration requirement letters. Let me talk about that for a moment. They’re a mess, and they I don’t care if it’s a simple one. They are hard to read, even for lawyers. I wish if you work for PennDOT, please change those letters like they are so damn confusing to people that I. I think a lot of people get them and they throw them out.

00:26:54:19 – 00:27:16:24
Unknown
They try to look at them. But a lot of these people, they’re not like, you know, a lot of times professionals, and they aren’t always going to lawyers to have them decipher this, this jargon in these letters. And I think a lot of these people are overwhelmed by it, which is technically kind of BS, like it’s supposed to be informing the people about what’s happening and specifically what they need to do.

00:27:16:26 – 00:27:38:19
Unknown
And it tries, but it’s a pretty weak try. And I think more than anything it is confusing and they get frustrated and then they don’t have the wherewithal or the money or the backing or just the forethought to go to a lawyer and unpack this and fix it. That’s how people end up in these license suspension black holes, because they might have been eligible.

00:27:38:19 – 00:28:00:19
Unknown
I just had a case this week. Here’s an example. Guys. I had a case literally yesterday where a girl, a woman that I represented, PennDOT, had screwed her over so many times, she was interlock, eligible for years, and she had the interlock in her vehicle and she kept sending the application into PennDOT. She kept applying for the license.

00:28:00:22 – 00:28:22:08
Unknown
She sent the form in, she sent the fee in with the check. And you know what they did after like years of jerking her around PennDOT and I’ve never seen this letter, and I gave it to the judge and I saw it. I said, judge, I, my client got this letter from PennDOT. It’s on PennDOT letterhead. This letter literally said, we’ve received your application for your interlock license.

00:28:22:11 – 00:28:41:19
Unknown
You are eligible to have your regular license restored. Here is your check back for the interlock license that you’re applying for, essentially saying go get your license back. Right. So then what does she do? She goes to try to get her license back at PennDOT. And what do they tell her? No, no. Now you’re now you have to get your interlock on.

00:28:41:19 – 00:29:01:01
Unknown
And she shows them the letter from their own agency saying, no, you guys, I send it back to me. You literally sent me my money back. And they’re still, like, in this weird cycle. So we actually went she got charged with driving on her suspension because she’s been in this she’s been suspended all this time. And we went in and I showed this to the judge and we the case got dismissed.

00:29:01:05 – 00:29:16:19
Unknown
Like, we we looked at this and we all thought it was outrageous. The cop withdrew it. The judge dismissed it like it was gone. And and I told her immediately after court I got her a court docket. I said, you march yourself right over to PennDOT. And guys, she had a driver with her, so she wasn’t driving herself.

00:29:16:22 – 00:29:32:20
Unknown
And she marched right over to PennDOT and I said, go to headquarters. And the judge said that to go to Harrisburg, we’re close enough here in New York that if you got a PennDOT issue that you can’t figure out, go to headquarters. And that’s where she went. And I actually waiting to hear back from her today, still to see what happened.

00:29:32:20 – 00:29:52:23
Unknown
But I sent her up there with the docket. Her charge was dismissed. And it’s just this mess that PennDOT creates. And when you call PennDOT I this is what I say to people. And this is kind of rude, but I don’t care. Like you call PennDOT, you get any random yo yo on the line. If you call three times about the same issue, I promise you’re going to get three different answers.

00:29:52:28 – 00:30:20:11
Unknown
And that is so stupid and frustrating. And it causes so many problems for people because the random folks that pick up when you call the PennDOT hotline are not trained or educated enough to actually advise people what is going on, and they just try to get you off the phone. A lot of times what they’ll say is you need to call a lawyer or call your legislator, or here’s what you need to do, but it’s completely wrong.

00:30:20:13 – 00:30:39:02
Unknown
And then you call back and it’s another answer because you’re talking to a different person. The moral of this story, guys, is if you have a PennDOT issue, you talk to your lawyer either ahead of time if possible, but you talk to an attorney and above all, go to headquarters and ask to talk to a supervisor at PennDOT.

00:30:39:04 – 00:30:56:04
Unknown
Do not talk to the random person on the cell on the phone. That will not work, and it’s probably going to put you in a situation that is even worse because it’s going to be misguided information. The other thing is, there’s a lot of local DMVs around these little like, hub offices, right? I know here in York County we have one on South Queen Street.

00:30:56:04 – 00:31:16:29
Unknown
It’s the PennDOT office. Sometimes people have success going in there, but more times than not they don’t. And then I tell them, go to headquarters. You’re going to have a lot more bang for your buck. If you get to talk to a supervisor at headquarters. This license stuff, guys, is big. It hurts people so much. And I want to help all these people and I feel bad for them.

00:31:16:29 – 00:31:38:13
Unknown
But you got guys, if you’re in these situations, you have to treat it seriously. You need to get an attorney. You need to fix it. Like do not just wallow in the cycle of just keep being suspended, like act, protect yourself. Well, and the other thing too is that, I mean, they’re they’re making you jump through hoops to get your license back.

00:31:38:16 – 00:31:57:08
Unknown
But the point is you have to jump through all the hoops. So like to your point, I mean, you when you get one of these letters, if you’re not, if you’re just like, well, I don’t I don’t get it and then doesn’t make sense. Whatever. Yeah. Well then you’re never going to get your license back. So having an attorney who helps you, who helps identify the hoops and tell you what you need to do to jump through them to get your license.

00:31:57:08 – 00:32:18:00
Unknown
Fact. That’s how you get your license back, for better or worse. You got to jump through the hoops. I got one for you too. This is one that just happened to me, where we resolved a case at a summary trial, and then the court mistakenly put in the original offense as the conviction. And that triggered a suspension. Yeah, that’s not what he pled guilty to.

00:32:18:01 – 00:32:36:13
Unknown
And do you know, Tim? And if you do, I want you to tell our viewers, do you know how the information actually goes to PennDOT from the court? Well, they enter it in their system, and then who sends? It’s the clerk of courts that actually sends the suspension information to PennDOT. Well, so the issue I don’t know where the issue was in the chain.

00:32:36:13 – 00:32:53:22
Unknown
I think that they I think they just entered the wrong conviction. Probably the clerk in the courtroom, because the way this works, guys, is you get you figure out the case in court with the judge. Yeah. Right. And the Da and you and your client. But then there’s a clerk of courts there. And by the way, we have a lot of really great clerk of courts here in New York.

00:32:53:22 – 00:33:11:16
Unknown
I love these people there. They if you ever have a problem. These are great people to talk to. Some of them are far more knowledgeable than the people that are involved in the system. You know, if you have a problem, you go to the clerk of courts. I love all of our clerks here in York. You guys do great work.

00:33:11:18 – 00:33:27:18
Unknown
And our current clerk of courts here in New York, he’s a wonderful man. The head of the clerk courts. But in any event, his name’s Dan Burns, by the way. Dan, we love you. We appreciate, you know, all the help you’ve given us over the years. But that’s how it works. You’re in court. The clerk of courts inputs the information.

00:33:27:19 – 00:33:48:20
Unknown
And then there is another person in the clerk of courts office, maybe down in their main office, who was actually responsible for sending that information to PennDOT. Right. And then PennDOT reacts. So at any rate. Yeah. The the the conviction got entered wrong. It was it was entered in as if he had pled guilty to an offense that carried a suspension.

00:33:48:24 – 00:34:08:13
Unknown
So he got a suspension notice from PennDOT. So I notified the court. The court to their credit, they were like, oh yeah, we’ll fix this. So they adjusted the conviction information and they sent a letter to PennDOT basically advising them, hey, this was wrong. This is what he pled guilty to. The letter that he got back from PennDOT is.

00:34:08:16 – 00:34:26:11
Unknown
I told him to be on the lookout because I gave him kind of like an like a deadline. I was like, let’s get maybe like, let’s wait a couple of weeks. We have 30 days from the date of your license suspension to appeal it. So let’s say let’s wait a couple of weeks. You don’t get something from PennDOT saying that they have rescinded the suspension.

00:34:26:17 – 00:34:56:25
Unknown
Then I’ll file the appeal and we’ll go that route. So he and I talked about that. And then the very next day, he got a letter from PennDOT. And the letter from PennDOT is very confusing because it basically does not explicitly say that his license is being restored. What it says is they’ve removed the suspension that was triggered from the erroneous conviction, and they’ve also indicated that he might be eligible to get his license back.

00:34:56:25 – 00:35:17:10
Unknown
But the letter ends by saying, if this action makes you eligible to drive, you will receive additional correspondence advising you of the fact of that fact. So he got a letter. And this the whole point of this letter is basically saying, we’ve removed the record on your driving history, that you pled guilty to this offense and that that causes a suspension.

00:35:17:12 – 00:35:38:01
Unknown
We have added the proper conviction, but we’re not sure if that means you get your license back. Well, they didn’t explicitly say that they were restoring. They did not. They did not. They said that that letter is coming at a later time. Yeah. So like that’s sitting duck. So you’re just. Yeah. Yeah. So it’s technically they’ve rescinded his suspension.

00:35:38:04 – 00:35:59:21
Unknown
He’s in no man’s land. He’s in no man’s land because he’s his suspension has been rescinded. But he has not gotten notice that he, that he has a license yet. Yeah. So this is the problem with PennDOT a lot of times. And I mean it, this is where it gets to be a mess because PennDOT, again, for better or worse, if they make mistakes like this.

00:35:59:21 – 00:36:22:16
Unknown
And let’s be clear, the mistake in this case is not on PennDOT. They are not the ones who I mean, they just reacted to what they received. Yeah. So but if there is a mistake that is on PennDOT, let’s say there was a mistake. They’re not really gonna help you. So like I’ve had cases recently where someone has been suspended because PennDOT is treating it as a refusal for a DUI.

00:36:22:18 – 00:36:39:04
Unknown
But there wasn’t there wasn’t a refusal. And so either I don’t know where the error was if the police department submitted it as a refusal, or if PennDOT just thought it was a refusal. I don’t know who messed that up. I actually want to talk about that because that happened to me, and I know it happened to you recently because we talked about it.

00:36:39:06 – 00:36:55:18
Unknown
Okay, guys. So this this is a situation where I had a client in ten years was, I think, identical to this. They had they were charged with a DUI and they get a the letter that people get when they refuse the blood test. But my client had not actually refused a blood test. He gave blood and there was a blood alcohol level and everything.

00:36:55:23 – 00:37:16:16
Unknown
But he gets a letter from Penna that says, we’re taking your license for a year because you refuse the blood test, right? And I looked at that. That’s that’s clearly an error, and I so what I did is I called the police department, and I think that’s what I told you to do. Yeah. We called the police department directly, and, I talked I actually got the actual cop on the line who was involved with the DUI.

00:37:16:17 – 00:37:41:06
Unknown
I had to go to the actual cop who was involved. And we had to go through all the records, and we had to get the chief involved and look at those records. And it turned out he accidentally sent the form to PennDOT notifying them that my client had refused the license suspension. And that’s how you get suspended when you refuse, you actually the cop is responsible, per protocol, for sending a letter to PennDOT.

00:37:41:06 – 00:37:59:01
Unknown
A notice that you did refuse in that triggers the automatic suspension. And this is actually one way sometimes you can avoid getting suspended. If you can get Ahold of the cop and, you know, talk to them about not sending that notice, but they’re pretty much under orders to do that. We had a hard time getting that fixed. I mean, it wasn’t until after the case was resolved.

00:37:59:01 – 00:38:14:17
Unknown
And so how did you fix it? Because it’s the same kind of way that you did by. But what did they do to actually fix. Well, I don’t know what they did. Okay. I’ll tell you what did the result, the end result was that PennDOT was like, we rescinded the suspension. But by the way, you have a new suspension because of the DUI that you pled guilty to.

00:38:14:22 – 00:38:40:14
Unknown
So at that point, they don’t give you time credit. No, no meet at all. PennDOT is PennDOT is going to say, well, the error is not on us. It’s on the police department. So they’re not going to say, well, you served two, three, four months for a license suspension, and we’ll credit that to the suspension. You actually should show that they’re not as far as PennDOT is concerned, they have no way of doing that because every suspension is technically different.

00:38:40:17 – 00:38:54:24
Unknown
So it becomes a mess really quickly. And this is how PennDOT I think kind of screws you over. Now we toyed with the idea of filing an appeal and basically asking the judge to give the credit for that, which I don’t know if they can even legally do, to be honest with you. I don’t think they can.

00:38:54:25 – 00:39:09:02
Unknown
Yeah, I know we talked about that together. What did what did you end up doing? Did you end up filing? No. The client didn’t want to. And I get it because I told him I was like, there’s no guarantee. I mean, I if I were a judge, I’d look at it and be like, well, let PennDOT appeal me.

00:39:09:05 – 00:39:22:05
Unknown
Yeah. You know what I mean? Giving you the I’m doing it because I think this is kind of messed up. I almost wish you would have that. The client would have wanted to appeal that because I don’t I think most reasonable judges out there would be like, this is messed up. We didn’t really know which way the judge was going to go on it.

00:39:22:05 – 00:39:34:22
Unknown
And you didn’t want to spend the money. And if the judge is going to come in and be like and listen to every word that comes out of the PennDOT side and be like, well, there’s nothing I can do. I can’t legally, I can’t do this, then, you know, we’re kind of wasting our time. You’re spending your wheels.

00:39:34:23 – 00:39:54:05
Unknown
You want a judge in that case, you want a judge that is going to take the equity approach and be like, look, I the law may not allow me to do this, but I’m gonna do it. Yeah. And if a higher court wants to strike me down, then whatever. And again, if PennDOT would appeal that, it’s like you’re kind of being the ass then, you know, because that is that is their job.

00:39:54:06 – 00:40:22:17
Unknown
It’s an equitable restoration essentially at that point. Yeah. But to to back to what we were saying about the how this is get screwed up by police officers who erroneously send to form him the way we fixed it in my case. And I bet you this is exactly how it got fixed in your case, the chief of police from that department actually had to send a direct letter that the officer had to sign on to, to PennDOT saying that they submitted that in error, and that was the only way PennDOT would rescind it.

00:40:22:19 – 00:40:39:29
Unknown
Yeah. I don’t know if that’s what they did or not, because I never talked to the chief of the department. All I talked to was the it was a newer officer. He might have talked to his supervisor. Yeah. I don’t know if that was something that happened behind the scenes or not. Yeah. But it was just kind of one of those things where magically pendants like, by the way, you know, we’re taking the suspension back.

00:40:40:01 – 00:40:58:01
Unknown
Yeah. And by the way, here’s a new suspension. And by the way, no credit. Yeah. So go yourself. Yeah. I mean, it’s this is the government. I mean this is. Yeah. It’s the government. Yeah. And a lot of the I think a lot of the things that happen up at PennDOT are like, okay, here’s our situation. Let’s look at like a punch list, pull down menu.

00:40:58:01 – 00:41:23:04
Unknown
And like there’s not a lot of, individual complex thought happening up there. You know, it’s just a giant machine. Yeah. So and maybe that’s just the nature of how it has to be because it’s a machine. But I do, in a perfect world, wish that at least the line people that people in society are talking to would at least be a little more, I don’t know, compassionate and better trained.

00:41:23:04 – 00:41:52:05
Unknown
Because for some of these people, it’s like it’s ruining their lives, you know? So anyway. All right, let’s go back to, the tiers of DUIs and suspensions. Just send them a pop over to you. You are still here. Right here? Yeah, I’m just kidding. Yeah. So we’re going to talk about tier three now, right? With suspensions there, and I do after that, I want to jump back over to what happens with mandatory prison sentences with these tears.

00:41:52:07 – 00:42:15:06
Unknown
And what number do you why it is so but before we do that, let’s talk about tier three. What happens with your suspension. And again, I previously explained what a tier three DUI is. Again guys it’s .16 or higher or any drug related DUI which includes combination of drug and alcohol. Or tier three can be refusal with a warrant where you refuse the warrant.

00:42:15:08 – 00:42:39:17
Unknown
Yep. So for tier three duties for a first offense with A or D, it’s a 60 day suspension and you are immediately eligible for an interlock if you’d like. For a first offense tier three. Just straight plea. No. Ar.d that is a one year suspension. Again, you are immediately eligible for a second, third or fourth offense.

00:42:39:17 – 00:43:04:26
Unknown
It’s 18 months and you have to serve half of the 18 months before you are eligible. So nine months. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No spot on Justin. That’s good. I do okay. I also want to talk briefly about, fourth offense doings here for a moment because something really, really bad happens at number four. And guys, this is within ten years the look back period.

00:43:05:01 – 00:43:27:20
Unknown
And just so you guys understand the lookback period before I get into this, the lookback period for DUI is because I get a lot of questions about this too. It goes from the date that your prior DUI offense was disposed of in court. Okay, so this would be the date you got accepted onto ar.d the date you pled guilty and got sentenced, or the day you were convicted at trial and got sentenced.

00:43:27:24 – 00:43:52:19
Unknown
That is the date of disposition. So the lookback goes to that date. It doesn’t go to the date that you’re a fence happened. Okay. So a lot of people think, oh, I’m good because my offense happened, you know, over ten years ago. But your date of disposition was within the ten year window. And that jams a lot of people up and aggregates the new DUI to a second, third or fourth offense.

00:43:52:22 – 00:44:18:26
Unknown
So please understand that it goes from the day to disposition, the prior offense to the date of offense for the newest offense. Now, when you get to number four, the thing that really screws a lot of people is you become, ineligible for restrictive probation, right? So I’m going to go to YouTube here. What is restrictive probation? What am I talking about here?

00:44:18:29 – 00:44:42:07
Unknown
It’s house arrest. Yeah. It’s a fancy word for house arrest instead of the mandatory jail time. Yeah. So with third offenses, there’s it’s the same mandatory minimum one year, but you could theoretically get house arrest for the third offense. And usually if you’re going to get house arrest, there’s usually a mix of jail and house arrest. Well for a third offense.

00:44:42:07 – 00:45:00:18
Unknown
Yeah. They’ll do like a split sentence in New York right. And this is probably a good time to kind of I want to go to all three of us here, a good time to kind of go through this a little bit because guys and understand this you if you have a fourth offense to you, I, you have to do the entire mandatory minimum in prison.

00:45:00:20 – 00:45:22:23
Unknown
You aren’t going to get any breaks on partial house arrest for some of that time or all house arrest. You are doing all of that in prison with DUIs. You can do your prison time either in state prison or in county prison. This is also a distinction that is individualized to DUI. So up to five years, right? I think to seven because now.

00:45:22:29 – 00:45:44:00
Unknown
Yeah. Because now, third offense, DUIs, tier 3 or 7 year maximums. And you can actually see that third offense. But fourth offense would be it’s also two. What’s that. The fourth offense highest. Here’s an F2. Yeah. And a fourth offense. So the maximum is not seven years. It’s ten. Yeah. Yeah. But even that you can serve that in county.

00:45:44:01 – 00:46:12:26
Unknown
You could the the minimum number the jail time. Yeah. Okay. And just so you guys kind of understand what we’re talking about here, like okay. General sentencing for crimes, not DUIs. If you, if your maximum penalty is two years or more, that has to be served in a state correctional institute or a state prison. So this usually means your minimum sentence is a year or more.

00:46:13:02 – 00:46:32:20
Unknown
Yeah. Okay. So it’s it’s confusing. But that is the distinction between whether you sit in county jail or whether you go to state prison. Right. Is that I’m right on that, right? Yes. So like yeah, but I think I think it’s between 2 and 5 years though I think for a DUI, I mean, I could be wrong. Maybe we should look into this.

00:46:32:22 – 00:46:51:06
Unknown
There definitely is an exception for DUI. Yeah. DUIs are different than regular yes crimes, but I think so. If a judge sentenced somebody on a fourth offense to 1 to 10 years, they can serve that. They could serve that entire thing in county. Yeah, yeah. Because in county you’re going to get out at your mandatory minimum. So you’re serving a year.

00:46:51:07 – 00:47:07:19
Unknown
Well, theoretically, theoretically they don’t have to parole you. But we all know in county prison, unless you really screw up, you get paroled at your mandatory minimum different from state. If you serve your time in state, you have to go before the parole board. The parole board has to agree to parole you. It’s a it’s a hearing. It’s it can sometimes be exacerbated.

00:47:07:19 – 00:47:26:11
Unknown
Usually is. Usually you end up serving a lot more than your entire sentence, your minimum sentence and county. You’re almost always getting out at your mandatory minimum unless you really did screw up in jail. I don’t know if you get you get good time in state. No, there’s not a good time. Like automatic thing like that happens in county.

00:47:26:13 – 00:47:42:11
Unknown
It’s five days for every month in county. Yeah. Is that what it is? Not on PVS those you don’t get. Good. Isn’t there also a rule about domestics? Like you can’t like certain there are certain crimes. They don’t give good time and they do. I learned this recently. They do give good time for work release too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:47:42:12 – 00:48:11:22
Unknown
Well, that’s another big difference between state and county. Yeah. Is out made work released. I mean there is no out made in state prison right. So you still smoke cigars there though. You still watch a television I think. Yeah. Yeah. But dude, I mean the out sometimes saves the case, right? I mean, like, the guy gets to go to work because you figure, I mean, like we were talking about, if it’s a split sentence, under normal circumstances, you may end up with like eight, eight months of county and four months of house arrest or whatever, and that satisfies the mandatory minimum, but that eight months you can serve on work release.

00:48:11:24 – 00:48:26:12
Unknown
The other thing I’ve seen recently is there are quite a few counties, and you might not expect it because some of these counties, you’d think it wouldn’t be like this, but they don’t do house arrest at all. Yeah. Oh yeah. No. Yeah, you’re absolutely right. That’s a whole nother topic I want to talk about. This is counting by county.

00:48:26:13 – 00:48:45:14
Unknown
Yeah. This is county by county. Whether you get all house arrest for your mandatory minimum or partial or none. Right. Yeah. Because the statute in title 42 merely allows for people to serve the mandatory minimum one house arrest. But generally there needs to be agreement from the other side. And also the judge has to agree to do it.

00:48:45:14 – 00:49:19:05
Unknown
Yeah. And this also brings me back to our original point. Like I think we said this like about being proactive in DUIs and being early if you aren’t getting your drug and alcohol evaluation, getting into counseling, showing effort, doing classes, doing all this stuff that we as lawyers set you up on early in a case, if you piss around, stick your head in the sand and wait and do nothing, the judges see that at the end of your case and when they’re sentencing you, there are judges here in York County and across the state who will not give you the major benefit of all house arrest because you didn’t get on the ball quick enough,

00:49:19:10 – 00:49:37:20
Unknown
or maybe at all, you know, so guys, get on the ball, like get your life together like the other. Talk to an attorney. The other thing that we should say is that you’re almost always for DUIs. You’re pretty much always going to end up with a sentence that is minimum to maximum. So that’s something that people need to keep in mind.

00:49:37:22 – 00:49:59:22
Unknown
Is that for F2 and F3 you’re going to be on supervision for a long time. Yeah. There’s going to be a long supervision tale because the statute also says that to the extent that treatment is required, and it almost always is for repeat DUI offenses, if there’s a treatment need that’s identified, the judge has to max out your sentence on the DUI.

00:49:59:24 – 00:50:24:11
Unknown
So the judge cannot give you like for a third offense, DUI a 1 to 2. They can’t do that. If the treatment is identified, the judge has to blow your maximum out to to the stat max, which is seven years, and then you’re on parole for that long now for six years. That said, you can actually probation sometimes after the fact will terminate probation early on some of those.

00:50:24:12 – 00:50:45:16
Unknown
But see, this is another thing though, is that technically you’re not. So the new act 44 doesn’t apply because it doesn’t apply to parole. So technically you’re not eligible for early release from parole or technically you’re not. I see it’s it’s not a right. You’re not eligible for it. And technically they don’t have to go along with that.

00:50:45:17 – 00:51:06:23
Unknown
Well, and you’re right. And the judges actually have to order it now. Yeah. It’s no longer just probation terminates you correct. Because they feel like you’re done. Yeah. Like they actually have to petition the court to terminate you early. The judge has to agree and order it. But I have had a lot of like second offense DUIs. More specifically, I have to get like a 90 day house arrest, five year R sentence, restrictive probation.

00:51:06:24 – 00:51:23:07
Unknown
I’m just pointing out that. Yeah, part of the the letter of the law. The statute. Technically you’re not eligible for early release. No, I mean, I would go even further and say, I mean, I, I think there’s an argument and I’ve made this argument that the judge has the discretion to terminate it. But there is but the statute does not say anything about parole.

00:51:23:07 – 00:51:44:25
Unknown
It says probation. So and, and I think the, the interpretation of a lot of probation departments is this applies only to probation not to parole sentences. So if you’re dealing with a parole sentence, which you could say or are, and there could be a legitimate argument that you’re not eligible for early termination of that supervision, because it is all not probation.

00:51:44:28 – 00:52:05:00
Unknown
And a judge may be sympathetic to that. And we we have judges, I think, that are willing to kind of flex and bend on that stuff, especially if nobody really cares. But again, county by county, you could be on the hook for the full six years of your probation tale or your parole tale. Yeah. Well, and I think the DA’s office also gets input into those.

00:52:05:01 – 00:52:23:00
Unknown
Yeah, they do get consulted. Yeah. When we were there we would always. Well, not always, but, normally if there was an objection to somebody being terminated early from probation specifically, I’ve never actually seen one for you, but I never was the person who, like, I almost never was the one directly consulted. I think a lot of that came from higher up than us.

00:52:23:01 – 00:52:48:04
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, the Chiefs over there and actually the A.D. or the district attorney, the elected Da, I think ultimately gets when I was in Dauphin, we would get c parole stuff all the time. Doc is state prison. Yeah. Yeah that’s what I’m saying. I’m talking specifically about the early termination of probation here in your county. Right. But I’m saying that that the only time I ever saw that, that it ever came to me directly was from the Department of Corrections for state census.

00:52:48:05 – 00:53:14:14
Unknown
The county stuff, I think, doesn’t it? Almost never goes through the line. Attorney. No, I believe it goes straight to the like to the attorney. Yeah, like I know. Yeah. Well, obviously here in your county, district attorney Barker. And, when one of those would come up like an early termination hearing if or. Well, the DA’s office objected, it would come straight from from da Barker and I would get a copy of, you know, his, I guess, opposition paper.

00:53:14:22 – 00:53:30:04
Unknown
It was, I think, 1 or 2 pages and it would just say we’re opposed for whatever reason, he would give a reason. Would you have a hearing on that then? Yeah, yeah, pretty much have to at that. Yeah. So they, they bring you in and then probation there and probation says why they think it should be terminated.

00:53:30:06 – 00:53:48:26
Unknown
Early. And then really, the only time I ever objected was if I was specifically given, like one from your boss who said. Yeah. And I mean, there was maybe 1 or 2 other times where, you know, you look at the facts of the case and most of the time when we were opposing them, it was due to like there was a victim in the case.

00:53:48:28 – 00:54:15:05
Unknown
Right. And that is that isn’t that’s a gray area. That’s pretty much the only time I ever resisted as well, was because act 44 does not specifically address the question of what role a victim’s input plays into the early termination. They make it sound like early termination is is a right at a certain point. But there is also a pretty compelling argument that that statute conflicts with the Victim Rights Act and that it violates victims rights.

00:54:15:07 – 00:54:32:08
Unknown
So I actually had a hearing recently where we objected. It was a serious case. I mean, it was like a sex offense case. And the victim was heavily in objection to early termination of probation, even though act 44 said this person potentially would qualify for it because I think it was pled down to like a non Megan’s Law fence.

00:54:32:10 – 00:55:06:08
Unknown
Yeah, but but we all knew the facts that were alleged in the victim’s opinion and the victim was against it. And the judge basically said like again I’m not going to override the victim. I know there’s a there’s a conflict of laws potentially here. Again, let the Superior Court figure it out. So there’s all kinds of issues like this when it comes to getting off supervision early or getting out of jail early, and all of that is going to be heavily variant, depending on what county you’re in and what judge you’re in front of, and who the prosecutor is and what the probation department thinks, because you have all those hands in the pot for

00:55:06:08 – 00:55:24:18
Unknown
a DUI case. I mean, you’re going to have the Da, you’re going to have probation, you might have victims, you’re going to have a judge. And so you have a lot of people that are going to be wondering, what do we do with your case? And if you have more charges involved, you could be having a case, a part of your sentence that’s restricted probation.

00:55:24:22 – 00:55:42:05
Unknown
You could have a part of it. That’s jail. What time begins when and what time ends? How do they structure the sentence? Are they putting you in jail first and then parole you to your house arrest? This gets messy and complicated really fast. The more crimes that are involved, the more offenses you have. And depending on what you’re looking at.

00:55:42:06 – 00:56:03:10
Unknown
Yeah. Okay. Good. Well, one of the other things I’d like to point out, we were just talking a little bit about fourth offense DUIs and how you can’t get any house arrest for that by statute. I also want to point out the only way, even for lower DUIs, that you qualify by law to get house arrest is if you do a drug and alcohol evaluation and are engaging properly in treatment.

00:56:03:12 – 00:56:27:05
Unknown
If you are just kind of like, I want house arrest, get me house arrest, Mr. Lawyer, but you don’t pick up your own, you know, you know your own self and go and actually do anything to help your case. You are statutorily ineligible. You’re only then you have to go to jail. Yeah. And we have to prove at these sentencing hearings, like we have to prove it to the judge that you did the evaluation and that you did do the counseling if it was recommended.

00:56:27:05 – 00:56:48:01
Unknown
And I’ve looked at this statute pretty hard recently. Technically, the way the statute is worded, the CRN is the requirement to get you out of jail. It’s the CRM that you have to do to avoid jail time. But the CRM, if they identify a drug and alcohol evaluation, you have to do that to to avoid jail. And I think Carnes don’t identify the drug.

00:56:48:01 – 00:57:03:25
Unknown
And yeah, and in York County, I mean in your county, the approach is we want the CRN and the drug and alcohol. You’re you’re if you went into it in front of a judge in York County and said, I did the CRN, they did not recommend a drug and alcohol. I’m asking for house arrest. So we didn’t do the drug and alcohol.

00:57:03:28 – 00:57:30:17
Unknown
Good luck. Yeah, because the judge is probably not going to send you a to house arrest, right? The other thing that we should talk about is under Deanna’s law, third and subsequent offenses have to run consecutive to any other sentence, including probation violations, which means that if you’re being sentenced on a DUI and anything else, including like a criminal contempt or something like that, the U.S. driving under suspension, it runs consecutive to all other sentences.

00:57:30:19 – 00:57:54:18
Unknown
Yeah. I had a guy before I left the DA’s office. It was like right towards the end. I want to say it was last November. I actually don’t know what ended up happening with the case. But when the attorney had reached out to me, it was a third offense, tier three. So one year mandatory minimum. He also had a, I think a second offense, 1543 B 1.1, which is two year mandatory.

00:57:54:20 – 00:58:19:11
Unknown
And then there was maybe an obstruction or something else there. And I mean, he was looking at basically 5 or 6 years because everything has to be run consecutively. And I don’t think that there’s I guess you could technically can you technically agree to not run it consecutive? It’s not treated the same way that the sentencing, the, like the strike laws are treated or like Megan’s Law strikes are treated.

00:58:19:11 – 00:58:33:11
Unknown
I’ve never seen a case you can’t opt out as a Da. I mean, I think the answer I think you have to. Yeah. I mean, I think you could have a Da that if they really wanted to go rogue or play renegade, they would, they would play that card and say, we’re waving the mandatory minimum. But I have never seen that.

00:58:33:18 – 00:58:51:25
Unknown
I’ve never seen that. I’ve seen no. Like, I mean, I, I didn’t agree to it. And I think that’s one of the reasons it ultimately didn’t plead out, like while I was still there. But if a judge enters, you know the sentence and runs them concurrently, if no one appeals it, then, right? Yeah. But I mean, the the issue is if a judge is going to do that.

00:58:51:25 – 00:59:08:14
Unknown
But you’re right. I mean, it would take an appeal to overturn it. The issue. I mean, the thing is that the General Assembly has spoken on this, and that’s really the big thing. That’s why I think prosecutors and judges feel constrained to do it this way, because the intent was, I mean, the statute was amended to reflect these changes.

00:59:08:18 – 00:59:31:20
Unknown
So the the clear intent was we’re taking third or subsequent DUIs way seriously. And again, for devil’s advocate purposes, statistically speaking, you’re talking about a fraction of a percentage. I mean, I think it’s I think at most it’s like 4%. I could be wrong about that. It’s been a while since I’ve looked at these stats of drivers on the road who have a DUI at all.

00:59:31:23 – 00:59:56:14
Unknown
So, I mean, you’re talking about a very small percentage of all drivers who have ever even gotten a DUI. So picture how small the percentage is of drivers on the road who have more than one DUI. And then picture how small the percentage is who have 3 or 4 or 5 or 60 UIs. So if you’re getting three or more DUIs in ten years, you are in a very infinitesimal, infinitesimally small subset of drivers on the road.

00:59:56:22 – 01:00:20:04
Unknown
That’s why they’re coming at you as hard as they are, because you are uniquely different to all the other drivers out there. You are a statistical anomaly. And this General Assembly has said this is an anomaly we want to crush. Yeah, well and agreed. But then let’s also point out here in York County we have something for second or subsequent DUIs on bail that comes into play called target 25.

01:00:20:06 – 01:00:45:11
Unknown
And the reason it’s called target 25, for those of you that don’t know, is because the court system, the district attorney’s office that has put this into place, this protocol in York, have looked at the stats on this, and it’s about 25% of all DUIs that even happen that are second or subsequent. Now that’s that’s statistic was created again while ago.

01:00:45:12 – 01:01:08:17
Unknown
It was a while ago when the target 25 system went into play. I don’t know if it’s still accurate, but it’s probably there. But they call it target 25. And what this means guys, target 25 is this if you get charged with a DUI and it’s a second or subsequent DUI in York County, Pennsylvania. And I do believe that Lancaster and Dauphin counties have also picked up something kind of similar.

01:01:08:17 – 01:01:29:00
Unknown
I think it’s called something different. And often it’s called drop, drop, drop. Yeah. They are going to require that you put an alcohol monitoring bracelet on your ankle if it’s an alcohol related DUI, or that you do random drug testing the entire time that you were on bail. And furthermore, you are also going to essentially be kind of like on probation.

01:01:29:00 – 01:02:02:19
Unknown
They call it supervised bail, where you have a probation officer that you have to check in with regularly. Usually it’s online or over the phone. Initially it’s in person, but they do it that way with online check ins and what they’ve seen. And obviously the reason that they’ve done this guy’s is it if we put someone on an alcohol monitor on there right away, when they get that second by the likelihood that that person is going to end up getting a third to UI while they’re pending the second DUI, it drops almost to zero at that point.

01:02:02:22 – 01:02:18:26
Unknown
Yeah, I mean, it’s not, but it’s close. Whereas before they did this, people were racking up second, third, fourth offense to UIs over the nine months that their case was even half that is that is something that can be demonstrated with statistics, is that if you do get one DUI, your odds of getting another go up a lot.

01:02:19:02 – 01:02:55:26
Unknown
So I just did some, I asked I get here for some statistics actually. Very curious. Yeah. So from 2020 and then I’ll do 2022 and 2023. These are some just actually crazy statistics. So, in 2020. This is PennDOT data 17,385 total D convictions. Not talking about any type certain offense 41% or 7142 of those convictions were a first UI 36% or 6257 were a second.

01:02:56:04 – 01:03:25:26
Unknown
Wow, that’s actually a pretty close number. Yeah. 13% 2337 were a third and then 10% six 1649 was a fourth or subsequent. So yeah. Pretty crazy. And then I actually think I mean, like to your point, Tim, like you said, infinitesimal. That’s, that’s not that’s actually like that’s just in a given year. What, what what I was saying is if you picture this, the, the slice, the pie slice as out of total drivers on the road, it is drivers.

01:03:26:01 – 01:03:42:29
Unknown
It is infinitesimally small. That is infinite. No, it’s I’m not even including people who have DUI. I’m saying that the denominator is all drivers on the road. Yeah I am, I think that’s a surprising statistic. Statistic because they’re putting it in terms of breakdown of people who’ve got a DUI in a given year. That’s the stat. So it is going to be larger.

01:03:43:05 – 01:04:08:00
Unknown
But even this bears out the point that the seconds, the thirds, the force, those are not large chunks of the overall DUI offenders out there. Those are considerably smaller. Yeah, there they are. And as as a percentage of all motorists on the road, that is a really small percentage. Yeah. It is. And then so for 2022 and 2023, this is from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Pennsylvania.

01:04:08:02 – 01:04:41:06
Unknown
Data. So 2022, more than 56% of all DUI convictions represented repeat offenders. So second or subsequent and then in 2023, nearly, it says nearly 13,302nd or subsequent DUI convictions, representing more than 58% of all convictions. So the number of repeat offenders seems to be going up. Yes. Well, yeah. And that makes sense, because what that statistic is saying in one sentence is if you get a DUI, you are substantially more likely to get another DUI, right?

01:04:41:08 – 01:04:59:26
Unknown
And that’s goes back to my point of why target 25 went into effect. Whether you agree with it or you don’t, it avoids the second and the third and the fourth. And while you have the second, you know, theory and theory, I mean, having a monitor around you that beeps if you consume alcohol does not stop people from what’s more than beeping.

01:04:59:28 – 01:05:16:17
Unknown
It sends a notice to your probation officer, who then revokes your bail and you go sit in prison. Right. But and that’s what I was getting ready to say, is that if you aren’t compliant with these conditions, it often means that either your bail is going to get revoked, or if your bail isn’t revoked, it means your sentencing outcomes are going to be a lot worse.

01:05:16:18 – 01:05:31:18
Unknown
Oh yeah, dude, if you get a bail, if you get a supervised bail target 25 violation when you go to get sentenced and you go in there and say, please judge, please give me all house arrest. I did a drug and alcohol evaluation, and they see that there was a bail violation that you drank while you were on bail.

01:05:31:22 – 01:05:48:24
Unknown
I promise you, you’re not getting all house. Yeah, because I mean, at that point, your normal split, maybe, like we said, maybe if you’re lucky is, what, six and six for a third? For a third month and six months? That’s like, best case scenario that I think most of what I’ve seen is eight and four. You’re getting eight months of prison and four months of house arrest, right?

01:05:48:25 – 01:06:06:17
Unknown
Yeah. You get a violation of target 25 conditions. That’s gone. Yeah. You’re not getting that. You’re going to do you’re going to do 12 months in York County prison. Yeah for sure. Maybe state right. Yeah. And I’ve seen situations, guys where people who do really well, they’re on the bracelet. Okay. So this is what I say about the bracelet.

01:06:06:18 – 01:06:24:20
Unknown
The bracelet is a blessing and a curse. Whenever I have a client in a first meeting, go, oh, my God, I have to do this. This is awful. It’s going to ruin my life. I have one client. You know who you are. Who? The bracelet cramps her style. Okay. Like it? Jail also cramps your stuff. Yeah.

01:06:24:20 – 01:06:43:16
Unknown
So? So does. Yeah. Yeah. So all orange, in any event. You know, that said, it’s a blessing and a curse because it sucks. Because it costs money. Yeah. You have to wear the bracelet. It does vibrate, and it kind of wakes you up at night. Sometimes you got to make sure it’s charged, uncomfortable. It’s uncomfortable. You do get used to some of that stuff, but.

01:06:43:20 – 01:07:19:06
Unknown
And some people, it actually does rub their leg like, and they get like sores on it. But either way, that’s the curse. The blessing is this is why York County does do all house arrest for some of these DUIs, because where these counties where they don’t put you on target 25, there’s you’re getting a big benefit later in your case because you showed the court that you maintain that sobriety and you proved it for many, many months, you know, and a lot of these counties where they don’t put that stuff on you, you’re not getting all house arrested at the end of the day.

01:07:19:06 – 01:07:40:11
Unknown
So you’re looking at an inside of a jail cell. You’re meeting Bubba. You know, I had a case in Dauphin one time. I was I wasn’t even it wasn’t even my case. I was handling a bench warrant hearing for it as a prosecutor. And I really was not making a very vigorous argument. I mean, I was arguing bail needed to be like, monetary because this this person had, I think, five active DUIs at one time.

01:07:40:13 – 01:08:06:27
Unknown
And the judge revoked her bail was like, you are a danger to society. You are not getting bail. So like that’s the other thing to consider is that if you can’t demonstrate that you have the ability to stop and you just keep on going and keep drinking, keep using drugs, keep driving, all that stuff, the judge is very likely gonna put you in the jail, and you’re gonna stay there, and you might end up maxing out your sentence.

01:08:06:27 – 01:08:24:04
Unknown
Yeah, and it’s a protection from society thing. That’s that’s exactly what you said. That’s what probably the biggest thing that judges look at on bail. Do I have to protect society from you and think about that? I mean, this is a person who’s who’s charged with a bunch of DUIs, right? And they’re being denied bail. So, like, they’re in the same position as murderers in the first degree.

01:08:24:04 – 01:08:44:17
Unknown
Yeah, they’re in the same position as somebody who maybe has, like a stolen gun and shot somebody with it there in that. That’s the position you’re in as far as the law is concerned, guys, no joke. DUI cases sometimes take six months minimum to a year or more to resolve. So guess what? That person sit in that entire time, whether they’re sitting in jail.

01:08:44:17 – 01:09:04:24
Unknown
And I mean, that’s because like, there are definitely people out there that will act like DUI is no big deal. And I would say, you know, most DUI offenders are lucky. And it is kind of a garden variety DUI and it’s not a big deal. But there are a lot of DUIs where it is a big deal. And it’s really hard to argue that we shouldn’t look at it as a big deal.

01:09:04:24 – 01:09:33:10
Unknown
When you’ve got 4 or 5 of them active at one time, you’re just not getting it. Yeah, and that’s why, like I said, as far as the law is concerned, you’re going to be in the same boat as people who have actually killed somebody. At a certain point. If you don’t stop. Yeah. Okay. One of the other things I wanted to point out to our viewers with DUIs where the penalties get, they’re all draconian, I think, because, again, across the board, except for a tier one first offense DUI, it’s mandatory jail time in Pennsylvania.

01:09:33:11 – 01:09:53:18
Unknown
That is kind of crazy. I like when I tell clients that sometimes they look at me and they’re like, are you serious? Mandatory jail time for a first offense, do you I tier two? Yes, mandatory jail time. Now there are workarounds like we’ve been discussing where we can get you house arrest. We can work with you to get kind of better, to get house arrest and to prove it to a judge.

01:09:53:18 – 01:10:16:04
Unknown
So there are workarounds, but there are also certain levels of DUI where it’s not an entire workaround. You are doing some jail time. Maybe not the entire time, but you’re definitely going to do some now where it really changes with DUI sentences. And again, this is just where the penalties kind of become crazy, I think, is when you have a second offense.

01:10:16:05 – 01:10:39:25
Unknown
Tier three do UI the difference in penalty from a second offense tier two and a second offense? Tier three is you go from a six month maximum sentence to a five year maximum sentence, and you go from second offense. Tier 230 day mandatory minimum to 90 days of mandatory minimum. So that tail guys is the big deal here.

01:10:39:25 – 01:10:59:29
Unknown
You also go from a 12 month suspension to an 18 month suspension. So I think this is a tipping point that I think the legislatures have looked at and said, if you’re getting a second offense, highest rate, there’s a problem here that we need to send a message on. And that’s why the penalties start getting really crazy from that point forward.

01:11:00:02 – 01:11:14:04
Unknown
I just wanted to point that out to you guys. I mean, the moral of that is, if you get a first offense, you better damn well do your damn. Just not to get a second, because I will say the majority of DUIs at least that I defend are tier three DUIs. For whatever reason. They’re they’re not tier ones.

01:11:14:04 – 01:11:36:12
Unknown
They’re not tier twos. Do we get some of those? Yes. Do we see some of those? Yes. And I think we do enough DUI work here that that’s a pretty good cross section of how it actually is in court. That most people who have DUIs are tier three and I wouldn’t I don’t know that I would say that it’s draconian, because draconian means that it’s that it’s unjustifiably harsh.

01:11:36:17 – 01:12:05:08
Unknown
Yes. Tim, with his dictionary, I think I think that I get what you’re saying, and I think I think how we get to these is really the question. This is where I, I tend to agree with you is how do we get to these penalties? Because I’ve seen the way other states do this, and I kind of like the way some other states do it where they have every DUI is kind of treated the same, but they have a bucket of factors which, if present, aggravated and add to mandatory time and that kind of stuff.

01:12:05:08 – 01:12:21:20
Unknown
And so so you could because I think we can all picture a first offense DUI that is really, really egregious. And that person should do should do jail time because of what happened. They hurt somebody really bad or something. They were driving in a in a way that they shouldn’t have driven. Maybe they took the police on a car chase.

01:12:21:23 – 01:12:44:11
Unknown
So maybe that person shouldn’t get the luxury of waiting until their second or third offense before they’re looking at mandatory jail time. But maybe you have other offenses where, like I said, it’s kind of garden variety and maybe the mandatory penalty. We don’t need to trigger the mandatory penalty. So you have some states where it’s like this is it’s kind of a flaw, a threshold for DUI.

01:12:44:13 – 01:13:01:02
Unknown
And if your blood alcohol level is over a certain amount, well then we’re going to add a factor. It’s going to add plus one or and then if you hurt somebody that’s going to be plus two or you know like they’re going to add all these factors in. And at the end of it based on your specific DUI, that’s going to be how bad the penalty is.

01:13:01:05 – 01:13:22:02
Unknown
I think something like that is more desirable in my opinion, because like you said, there really is a gap between first offense tier one and second offense tier three. There’s a pretty huge gap. Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. Like that’s almost a tipping point. So like and how do we get to that gap I mean you know that’s kind of the crazy part.

01:13:22:04 – 01:13:43:16
Unknown
Yeah. Okay. I did want to also point out one other thing to our viewers. There are some counties, it’s usually more rural counties or with lower populations because they don’t have the resources of some of the bigger counties where if they’re going to consider giving you house arrest, you have to serve that house arrest in the county.

01:13:43:18 – 01:14:00:11
Unknown
And this is kind of crazy because if you if you don’t live in that county. What do you do there? Then you then you don’t get the benefit of house arrest. It’s kind of the answer to that. So is there a workaround? Well, and first of all, guys, this isn’t York County. So the one county I’m thinking of is Adams County, which is right next to us.

01:14:00:18 – 01:14:23:11
Unknown
They actually require that you serve your house arrest in that county physically and geographically. So you either have to have a house there, stay with a friend there, or I have some clients from Adams County who have rented hotel rooms, like long stay hotel rooms, just so they could serve their house arrest instead of going to jail. They also won’t transfer the supervision, even though they could.

01:14:23:12 – 01:14:38:24
Unknown
They won’t. Yeah. And again, I’ve asked why. Like we I say sometimes like, hey guys, we do this in York County. We we let people serve house arrest in Utah. Is it is it just the money? I think it’s resources and I think it’s money. Yeah. That’s kind of the best answer I’ve gotten from the people I’ve talked to about it.

01:14:38:25 – 01:14:56:24
Unknown
So it’s it’s important to know that. And there are a lot, a lot of rural counties in the state of Pennsylvania. I know we work in a lot of the more populated counties, given where we’re at kind of in south central PA, but again, Adams County, right next door is one of the more rural counties. Great, great Diaz over there, great people.

01:14:56:26 – 01:15:14:24
Unknown
The Da over there, Brian. Senate, I. He’s a good guy. He’s been he’s been a Da for many years there. He’s he’s short. But again, it’s a resource thing I think a lot of the time. So. All right, I want to before we finish up on the DUIs for today, I want to talk briefly about, just a ard.

01:15:14:25 – 01:15:41:20
Unknown
I want to hit a few points ard UI before we move on. Justin, I’m going to kind of pop over to you for this. So let me put it on me and you here. All right, so just a few quick questions here. Does Ardi mean that a driver avoids all license suspension consequences? No. As we discussed a little bit earlier, with ARD for a first offense, tier one DUI, that one you do.

01:15:41:24 – 01:16:09:05
Unknown
Because as we stated, there’s no license suspension that comes with that. Even if you were just entering a straight plea, unless you refused initially on the less, you refused initially separate suspension. So then for a tier two on A or D, it is a 30 day suspension, which is obviously much better than a year, because if you pled straight to a tier two first offense, that is a one year suspension, again, immediately eligible for interlock on that for a tier three first offense.

01:16:09:07 – 01:16:33:07
Unknown
Whether that is 0.16 or higher. Back drug or combination of drugs, drug and combination of alcohol or a refusal. It is 60 days. But again. Well, I yeah, you’d still be immediately eligible for the interlock with A or D. But it’s 60 days. Let’s just talk about that real quick because there is a distinction here between a ARD and conviction.

01:16:33:07 – 01:16:55:25
Unknown
So again the suspension is different, as you said. Right. Tier two is 30 days. Yep. For a ARD versus one year if you’re convicted, tier three is 60 days for ARD versus one year if you’re convicted. You are a eligible for ignition interlock on both of those. However, with a conviction, you have to get interlock in order to get your license restored.

01:16:55:25 – 01:17:15:25
Unknown
It’s mandatory you go through that period with a ARD. It is not mandatory. Correct. And what I tell my clients, and I think you guys do this too, is it’s a personal preference thing. Yeah. But most of the time if you’re trying to do interlock for like a 30 day suspension or a 60 day suspension, it ain’t worth the hassle.

01:17:15:26 – 01:17:36:13
Unknown
Like it’s too much of a pain in the butt. And PennDOT might screw it up. And if they screw it up, you might get suspended before you even can get it. And by the time you can get it, you’re already through your 60 day suspension. Yeah. You know, and I think for most people, again, most people, not all 30 or 60 days without a license is very doable.

01:17:36:14 – 01:18:05:23
Unknown
Yeah. It’s going to be a pain in the ass. But you know there’s busses, Ubers, Lyft, hopefully, if you have family or friends that can help you out. Depending on what your job is. Again, you know, one of the things I tell people is they’re like, should I tell my job? And depending on, you know, again, what they do, where they work, what their requirements are, it’s probably going to be pretty helpful in most cases to tell them what’s going on, especially if you’re going to be losing your license.

01:18:05:23 – 01:18:22:23
Unknown
And again, for 30 or 60 days, they may be willing to work with you and help you out and do certain things. If you get the full year, it’s a little bit different. But, again, I think it’s much it’s not worth the hassle, like you said, to to do the interlock for, for most people. And most people have some level of a support system.

01:18:22:24 – 01:18:39:13
Unknown
I have had clients who, like are like loners or they live, they’ve moved here from somewhere like across the country, and they literally have no support system. And they actually do go get the interlock. And that’s okay. I mean, they can, but the distinction that’s important there is it’s not required for ar.d whereas it is if you’re convicted.

01:18:39:13 – 01:18:59:28
Unknown
So that’s that’s a pretty big deal. Yeah. And then I see yeah I mean so another question here is if you get a ARD and this actually affects the new law. Yeah. That just went into effect. And I want you to unpack this. You get ARD now and you get another DUI. What happens to you? It’s because it’s not technically a second because you did a ard.

01:19:00:00 – 01:19:22:17
Unknown
But under the new law. Guys, I want you to explain this. You can be punished like it’s a second. So. Yeah. Go ahead. Jesse. So, when they change the law a few months ago, basically, they amended the statute to include prior ard, in mission and completion as an element of the offense to establish the second offense, DUI penalties.

01:19:22:19 – 01:19:45:02
Unknown
Yeah, if that makes sense. Yeah, they did. And they actually created a different subsection of 38023802. That’s right. So guys, now if you do ar.d you get your case dismissed, you don’t have a conviction okay. You go out and get another DUI within ten years of the date you were put on a ard, because remember, it’s the disposition date that counts.

01:19:45:06 – 01:20:00:01
Unknown
Is it the date that you’re entered or the date you’re. It’s the date you’re entered. You’re entered. Yeah. Not the date you complete. It’s the date you’re entered. That’s the disposition date, which could be helpful for some people. It could because it could move it outside. Possibly. But if you go out and get you’re going to get charged from now on.

01:20:00:01 – 01:20:29:20
Unknown
Under section 3802 H. This rocked the DUI world, guys, because before this they were there was some issues with whether they could even charge you with a second offense DUI, which created a whole bunch of issues with whether ARD was going to even be an option for people. For those of you that are clients and have been through the last year of DUIs with Ards, you know the causes, the causes that to this because we’ve explained them to you and you know, the problems that have happened and how a ARD actually got shut down for months.

01:20:29:20 – 01:20:53:11
Unknown
Yeah. For on a number of occasions it is now currently reopened. However, we actually haven’t had any new ARD hearings yet, but they’re coming for, you know, backlog of clients. But there are D has just changed. It has become innumerable, more challenging to even be accepted into the a ARD program. And this is why it is so important you act early.

01:20:53:16 – 01:21:15:07
Unknown
As I said in the beginning of this podcast, if you get pulled over for it to you. I talk to a lawyer right away. Do not wait to be charged and act quickly and be proactive. Okay, I’m going to leave it there because that’s an important, important part of this. Before we wrap up for the day, guys, I wanted to just talk briefly about the interlock again and just hammer home a few points here.

01:21:15:10 – 01:21:41:11
Unknown
So under Pennsylvania law currently with interlock, the law is not simply that you just serve the suspension and then get an interlock. Okay. The law is now better in that you have earlier eligibility to get interlock. You have the ability to get your privilege to drive back sooner, your ability to be out on the road again sooner if you take advantage of the early eligibility.

01:21:41:13 – 01:22:00:13
Unknown
But if you don’t know about it, you won’t take advantage of it. And I promise you, the PennDOT letters don’t tell you about this because I’ve read them. They don’t tell you about the early eligibility. So talk to your lawyer, have somebody that does DUIs regularly and knows this information because that is how you get back on the road.

01:22:00:13 – 01:22:17:18
Unknown
That’s how you get back to work. That’s how you start taking your kids around. Because guys, when you have the interlock license, it is called an ignition interlock limited license. Guess what? The only limitation is you have to have an interlock, and you can only drive the car with the interlock. You can drive at any time, anywhere with anyone in the vehicle.

01:22:17:24 – 01:22:36:24
Unknown
As long as you’re driving the vehicle with ignition, interlock in it and you can get around again. Your life gets back on track, so know what you’re doing with this. Get out of the black hole sooner you have already eligibility and take advantage of it. Do either one of you want to add anything to that? I mean, as far as that goes, I think that’s an important point for our viewers to know.

01:22:36:26 – 01:22:55:04
Unknown
No, no, I know I, I guess just specific to the interlocking. I don’t know if you want to do this now or after we talk a little bit more about it, but, 3808 under the vehicle code is operating without an ignition interlock or in tampering with an ignition interlock. Yeah, it’s a crime. It is. It’s its own crime.

01:22:55:10 – 01:23:20:01
Unknown
Just to, I guess, hit on that, quickly. So if you are required to have an ignition interlock and are found to be driving a vehicle without one. Subsection a one of 3808. Essentially addresses that, and it’s a 300 to $1000 fine up to 90 days in prison. It’s an ungraded misdemeanor. But if you are convicted of that or plead guilty to that, it adds an additional year to the interlock requirement.

01:23:20:05 – 01:23:41:06
Unknown
You don’t get suspended for a first, conviction of that for a second conviction. Second or subsequent. It’s it is a one year suspension and your ignition interlock license is recalled. Yeah. They take it back, they take it back, and you start over and, kind of. Yeah, that’s a black hole. You’re not going to be eligible for the ignition interlock license again at that point.

01:23:41:06 – 01:23:59:20
Unknown
And you’re also not going to be eligible for the occupational limited license either. Yeah. I mean, you’re you’re actually going to be going to be serving a suspension and then you’re gonna you are eventually going to become eligible again. But then you kind of have to. That’s why I’ve said you have to kind of start over. And then also for subsection, I believe it’s A2 is operating without an interlock while DUI.

01:23:59:23 – 01:24:19:25
Unknown
And for that you can actually get one of those without. Well, I guess technically without getting a DUI is 0.02 or greater. Oh three that’s .03. Yep. So if you have a 0.03 and you’re required to have an interlock and you don’t have one, they can hit you with that. And that’s at least 90 days in jail and $1,000 fine.

01:24:19:28 – 01:24:39:01
Unknown
Same thing. With the additional year of interlock and the suspension. Yeah, that’s a really important distinction. Justin. I hope you guys heard that you can get charged with that and have mandatory jail time and not even be charged with the duty, because the blood alcohol required level is a lot lower than the mandatory minimum. Yeah.

01:24:39:04 – 01:24:53:00
Unknown
You go from point A to .03 on that crime. Correct. Okay. Which again guys, I mean we can debate how much you get up to a .03 and we were doing this recently with an officer who we’re going to actually bring on the podcast soon. And I think he’s going to give us a lot more information on that.

01:24:53:00 – 01:25:21:05
Unknown
But yeah, I mean, not a lot to get to a point. Oh three. Generally speaking. Okay. There is something on I want to beat this around a little bit with you guys because this comes up a lot. And clients ask me about this. PennDOT website says that if you are required to get an ignition interlock device, you are required to get that installed on each vehicle that you own, operate, or lease during the required period.

01:25:21:07 – 01:25:39:17
Unknown
So this begs the question for a lot of people I know, like me and my wife, like we have multiple vehicles and they’re all registered to all of us or to both of us. And does that mean that I have to get the ignition interlock installed on all of my vehicles to drive them? So, Tim, I’m going to pop over to you here.

01:25:39:19 – 01:25:47:07
Unknown
What’s been your experience with this? And then I want to kind of explain what mine has been with clients who have run into this issue.

01:25:47:10 – 01:26:09:08
Unknown
Well, I mean, your question is kind of multifaceted. If your the answer is if especially if you’re driving those vehicles, yes. You have to have the interlock in the car for sure. Yeah. And that’s, that’s a for sure. Absolutely. But it is muddy. And this is where people get confused because the way it’s worded on PennDOT website on their fact sheets is not really clear.

01:26:09:08 – 01:26:34:08
Unknown
And they’ve actually changed this fact sheet over the years. If you look back at fact sheets, it says two different things over like a few different years. And it’s going back and forth and back and forth. I think the safe bet here, what I would advise my clients and what I currently advise my clients, and if I’m wrong about this, I want to know, but I haven’t actually had anybody come back and tell me I’m wrong yet.

01:26:34:11 – 01:26:50:05
Unknown
But if you’re a viewer and you actually know the answer to this, you don’t just want to complain and you want to comment, I’m happy to talk to you about it and like, be disappointed a little bit. But I think the answer is, as Tim was just saying, you only need to install the ignition interlock on the vehicle that you’re operating.

01:26:50:05 – 01:27:06:05
Unknown
If you’re Jay Leno and you have 50 vehicles, that’s not quite what I’m saying. Okay. Well hold on, let me finish my thought. Yeah. But I do want to. This is where I want to unpack it with you, but I am pretty sure you don’t have to install it on all of the vehicles that are titled to you, as long as you’re not operating that.

01:27:06:05 – 01:27:28:04
Unknown
But, Tim, did you want to add to that? Well, that so I mean, I think the way the law is written, unless there is case law or something that says opposite, I mean, I think you are technically required to install it on every device that you’re on, you’re an owner on. But how do they enforce that? Because you don’t have to do like a registration affidavit, you know what I mean?

01:27:28:05 – 01:27:47:26
Unknown
Unless you’re unless you’re applying for the non from the non ownership saying I don’t have it. That’s kind of an absurd result. Like let’s use the example of Jay Leno though, because you and I know I mean you got to be honest about this. If you have two vehicles you drive both of those vehicles. Yeah. Sometimes. Yeah.

01:27:47:26 – 01:28:04:04
Unknown
Even if you and your wife have a vehicle and you drive her sometimes. So, like, that’s the reason the statutes worded the way that it is. It is. But in practice, I mean, I don’t see people there’s not going to be a violation multiple or as long as you aren’t driving a vehicle with no interlock in it. Yeah, there’s not going to be a violation.

01:28:04:04 – 01:28:21:22
Unknown
That’s what I’m saying. Right? Yeah. So even though the statute might say that the ability piece you’re not going to be charged is that. Yeah. Is that you really should just have because the, the crime is just a driving a vehicle without the interlock device. It’s not driving the vehicle that has the interlock device. But. Oh, by the way, you didn’t get an interlock device in another car that you own.

01:28:21:22 – 01:28:41:06
Unknown
That’s not a problem. So it’s practical considerations here specifically to be convicted of it to what the statute says is it’s essentially just like the DUI. You have to be an actual physical control of the vehicle. So say you have two cars, you know, husband and wife. Husband gets the DUI and needs the interlock. You know, if wife’s driving her car with a husband in it.

01:28:41:09 – 01:29:00:11
Unknown
He’s you know, that’s not a violation, right. I would be curious to know if the car is registered to the husband in that case and, you know, police or they drive by a police vehicle and it scans registration and says that they need an interlock, you know, and they they pulled the can. They pulled them over at that point.

01:29:00:11 – 01:29:16:00
Unknown
I don’t think you can pull over just because it’s an ignition interlock device. I don’t think that’s a pool bull offense, but they can pull you over and then if they have reasonable suspicion for something else, they they can inspect the device at that point. Oh, sure. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I know I was there allowed to confirm. If you’re an interlock license holder.

01:29:16:00 – 01:29:30:07
Unknown
They’re allowed to confirm that. Yeah. Let me ask you this. If you guys had a DUI for our viewers, if you had a DUI and you had to get the interlock installed, would you install it in all of your vehicles? Because I know you all have multiple vehicles. Would you install on multiple vehicles or just the one you’re actually going to drive?

01:29:30:08 – 01:29:49:11
Unknown
I mean, in my case, I would probably need to install it on both because I do drive frequently, both vehicles. But you could also make sacrifices to say, listen, I’m just not going to drive your vehicle to. Yeah, but I don’t know if that would be workable because of your situation, because, I mean, if if I have if my wife is predisposed and I have to take the kids somewhere, then I have to drive the van.

01:29:49:12 – 01:30:07:25
Unknown
Yeah. So like, for me that that. Yeah, that’s the kind of situation where, like, I probably would have to put the device in. Who? We both have five children. That’s probably that’s the right answer, but it’s probably what we’d have to do. I didn’t really think about that. But for people who have maybe two, what do you do in that situation?

01:30:07:25 – 01:30:21:06
Unknown
If I got to drive five kids to the hospital or whatever, right. You can do what a lot of people do throw the hands up and be like, well, I’m just gonna do it. Yeah, I’m a risk. And then, you know, they’re gonna get caught. That’s the wrong answer because now, you know, one, it’s against the law, and two, you’re going to be in trouble.

01:30:21:10 – 01:30:43:04
Unknown
I think practically, though, for a lot of people’s individual situations because this what you’re getting at, Tim, is this is really an individual decision. You are probably okay as long as you limit yourself to only driving that vehicle. Don’t install it in multiple vehicles. I’ve had a few people ask me that they have classic cars, like right? We have a lot of people in New York who restore classic cars and things like that, and they say, hey, I’m just this thing sits in my garage.

01:30:43:04 – 01:30:55:08
Unknown
I take it out twice a year. We go to a road show. I wouldn’t want to put one in a yes. Can you even I mean, I don’t know, but that’s fine. I mean, if you can live with the fact that you can’t drive it for a year. Yeah, yeah. And that’s that’s what, that’s what I advise them.

01:30:55:08 – 01:31:16:18
Unknown
I said, listen, just sit it in the garage. You don’t have to get it in your car because they read this stuff online or in the statute and says, I have to get it on all my cars. And it’s like, no, I mean, they’d like you to do that because it’d be more money. Yeah, well, maybe that’s why the statutes written that I mean, to I think if you really wanted to comply with that and only install it in one vehicle if you change.

01:31:16:23 – 01:31:34:06
Unknown
Well, I don’t even know if it’s title change. I think if the car was registered not in your name, whether or not you own it, I think that would cover it. Yeah. Like usually. But it’s just registered to what’s on the phone. Own registered or or operate. Yeah. But say, you know, you and your wife own two cars.

01:31:34:06 – 01:31:52:12
Unknown
If you’re both on the registration, you’re both owners. Your name technically doesn’t need to be on the registration of the car even though you’re an owner. Yeah, but but theoretically. But if I was going to be an owner, then I would need to be on the title. Yeah, yeah, you’re on the. I’m saying though, like it like, and I think the statutes worded in such a way that it’s any of those.

01:31:52:13 – 01:32:12:05
Unknown
Let me just cut through this because I, I’ve had this with a lot of clients and I’ll explain my situation. All of my vehicles are registered to me and my wife, okay. We’re joint owners and all of our cars, and we have a few different vehicles. So what I’ve told clients who are married and have multiple vehicles or in this situation to be safe.

01:32:12:05 – 01:32:31:16
Unknown
And this is the point, Justin, you were making. Yeah. To be safe, just change the title and get yourself off the title to the what? The car that you aren’t going to drive. That might solely be the one your wife drives, even though you both own it. Just so you don’t find yourself in a weird scenario, you would also potentially have to take yourself off the registration too, because there’s a two different things I think you would do both.

01:32:31:17 – 01:32:46:20
Unknown
Yeah, you would do both. That’s what I was saying to him. Yeah, but I think that’s a that’s an easy fix to that, that, that we can advise them on. Okay. I think it’s one of those things where there’s probably what PennDOT would tell you to do, but it’s not going to be a problem unless you’re driving that vehicle without the device.

01:32:46:22 – 01:33:05:02
Unknown
Right. It’s like a lot of things, right? It ain’t a problem unless you’re caught. Yeah. Or unless you’re risking getting caught, you know? So just looking at the statute here, any motor vehicle to be operated by the person is equipped with an ignition interlock device. A person subject to the section shall only be required to notify the department or vendor of a motor vehicle.

01:33:05:02 – 01:33:27:05
Unknown
The person intends to operate during the period of the ignition lock usage. So the fact sheet is completely wrong compared to the statute. Yeah, that actually they might have modified that recently because that actually does clarify it, that you only really have to intend to operate it and what you’re going to operate. Yeah. To your point though, if you have five kids and you have two vehicles and you got to use the van, sometimes it’s both and you’re only going to drive the van.

01:33:27:06 – 01:33:49:06
Unknown
Yeah. So it looks like I’m not going to look this up right now, but there’s a 2025 amendment that says C section eight of act 58, whatever that is, in the appendix to this title for special provisions relating to findings and declarations. So I would assume that may again, I’m going to assume I could be wrong, but I think that would probably cover that aspect of it.

01:33:49:12 – 01:34:07:02
Unknown
You know, the the declaration as to PennDOT as to what vehicle you intend to drive. Yeah. So we can dig into let’s let’s talk about one other thing in the employment exemption affidavit. This is one that matters to a lot of people. So I want to talk about that. I just had this recently. Yeah. So I’m going to keep it on all three of us because I think this is a good combo to have.

01:34:07:04 – 01:34:37:19
Unknown
So, for any of you that work and drive, this is not like you’re a truck driver and you drive like a CDL truck, which is actually a whole other problem with a lot of this stuff that we didn’t even get into today. But if you drive, say you’re an electrician and you get a work van and you take it home and you drive it around to your jobs every day and do your electrical work, you can actually drive that work van without putting an ignition interlock in it, but you have to.

01:34:37:22 – 01:34:50:24
Unknown
There’s a lot of like, parameters to get to that point. That has to happen. Yeah. To make the player has to sign off on it. Your employer has to sign off on it. So you clearly have to tell your job. You have to have that conversation with your boss. Like, I have a DUI and my license is getting suspended.

01:34:50:26 – 01:35:13:04
Unknown
But the other thing is you have to get it in the ignition interlock device installed on your own personal vehicle to even be eligible to then do the ignition. I’m sorry, the employment exemption affidavit step. The other thing, too, is that because I had this recently with a client, he owned the company. Oh, so he is excluded from the exemption?

01:35:13:05 – 01:35:32:01
Unknown
Yes. That exemption does not apply to it. Screwed him. The fact that he owned the company. You cannot own the company that owns the vehicle. It can’t be your vehicle because otherwise you have to get a device in it. Yeah. So it can only be a like a vehicle you don’t own. Yeah. All of his employees could do it.

01:35:32:04 – 01:35:45:01
Unknown
Yeah. Any of his employees who got a DUI could get an ignition interlock in their car, and then they could get the employment exemption for his van, but he cannot. He would have to get it in the work van. He would have to have an interlock in the van. Yeah. Interesting. I like that point. Thanks for bringing that up.

01:35:45:01 – 01:36:10:11
Unknown
It’s a good one. Yeah, it’s a good one. All right. Well, anything else you guys want to go over today? I think that covered everything for the interlock. We talked about, you know, again, the operating with that one, like, just just don’t do that. You know, if, if you’re really in a, you know, kind of to Tim’s point what he said, like if I, if he had to take all five kids and didn’t have one in his van and, you know, just hopped in, probably if he.

01:36:10:12 – 01:36:30:08
Unknown
Well, let me put it this way. If you get pulled over in that situation and it’s truly like an emergency. Yeah, like life over lamb. Yeah. You may come out of that without a citation or you’re probably getting a police escort, but there’s always another option, right? Like like what stops me from calling an ambulance. So, so I’m, I’m willing to roll the dice and potentially pay a lot of money on court costs, attorney fees, all that stuff.

01:36:30:08 – 01:36:46:12
Unknown
But I’m not willing to pay the fee for the ambulance. Yeah. I mean, like, that’s the problem. Yeah, but maybe you feel it’s more emergent. You have to take your kid right away. You can’t wait for the ambulance to show up. Yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah, there’s variables. Options are infinite. But again, I dealt with this recently.

01:36:46:12 – 01:37:07:13
Unknown
A guy got, you know, pop driving a car that didn’t have the interlock in it. And now he’s dealing with that. And again I was like, well where do you need to do. He’s like, I had to go get cigarettes. It’s like, come on. Yeah. Not good enough. Yeah. Well, and the other thing to not to drag this out any further, but, I mean, these devices are also recording a lot of data.

01:37:07:17 – 01:37:23:02
Unknown
Yeah. So, like, I had a tampering case one time where the guy obviously tampered with this device. Oh, yeah. And he. And he was able to bypass the device. And so he drove around like that for eight months thinking. Yeah, I’m pulling a fast one. They knew he tampered with the device from the very beginning because the device was dying.

01:37:23:05 – 01:37:42:23
Unknown
He was bypassing the device. The device wasn’t even charging enough when he was running the car so that it could transmit data to the the company, so they knew it had been tampered with. But these devices are recording location data. Sometimes they take your picture or they’re taking video or audio. They’re transmitting. They’re transmitting data from the device itself.

01:37:42:25 – 01:38:01:11
Unknown
So you may think you’re pulling a fast one, but there’s going to come a point where the company is going to say, all right, we’ve compiled months of data on this showing that the device is being bypassed, and you’re going to get hit with tampering at that point. So like, don’t do that either because the device is recording data.

01:38:01:14 – 01:38:14:08
Unknown
Well, and that’s also I think recording you I think there’s a camera in it. That’s what. Yeah. That’s right. Some of them I don’t know if all of them do that. All of them do that because what they were seeing was people were having other people blow into it. Yeah. Blow into it. Yeah. Because it’ll take a snapshot.

01:38:14:10 – 01:38:29:25
Unknown
No parent of the year. But like I said, I mean they’re also recording location data and some of that other stuff too. And with the device guys you actually it’s not you blow it into it to start it and you’re done. You actually have to blow into while you’re driving. For those of you that don’t know, for those of you that do, I know that’s something that you gripe about.

01:38:29:25 – 01:38:50:06
Unknown
But yeah, it’s it’s you’re blowing into it constantly. It’s pretty it’s actually pretty excessive like a driving a distraction. Yeah. Right. And you talked about the cell phone. Yeah. Talked about the cell phone stuff recently, and it’s kind of similar in a way. I mean, you’re not really looking at it as much, but you are having. I was gonna say I messed with something with your hand.

01:38:50:11 – 01:39:09:26
Unknown
Obviously, I never had one. I know one of my buddies had one for a little while, but I don’t think I ever actually saw what it looked like or what one he had, and I what definitely wasn’t in the car with him when he was driving and had to do that. But, like you said, there are different types of devices and, I know the one.

01:39:10:00 – 01:39:25:24
Unknown
I have a client not for a DUI, but he just got his license restored and had to do has to do the interlock. It’s been a number of years since he was eligible to get it. And he finally, you know, was eligible. So he got it installed. And it looked like a little cell phone or a little walkie talkie.

01:39:25:26 – 01:39:40:26
Unknown
It was way different than what I had envisioned from, like, way back when. When you think of like, the and talks lock like it’s underneath, like the steering wheel and it’s like, got like a, almost like a, like a. Yeah. Like a hose or or I always think of like the, the phone cables, like the curly ones.

01:39:40:29 – 01:40:04:07
Unknown
But yeah, this one looked a lot different. So, Yeah, I don’t know. It seems like it’d be a distraction. Yeah. And that brings me to a great closing point for this podcast. And I said it earlier, we at our law firm, when we have clients who we represent for DUIs, not only are we always going to go with you, the implications indirectly to your driver’s license, to your interlock device that’s required or whatever that may be.

01:40:04:07 – 01:40:20:00
Unknown
And we’re going to talk through that. We’re going to sort through it. We’re going to figure out your best path forward to get your ability to be back on the road safely again. That is very important. But the other thing is with this interlock, it’s not just the interlock companies that are out there. Guys, this is a warning.

01:40:20:00 – 01:40:44:10
Unknown
This is a public service announcement. If you have a DUI, you are going to get inundated with mailings from interlock companies that are going to look almost like their PennDOT letters, and they’re going to look very official. These are solicitations. They are not real. They are trying to get you to come in and hire them and pay them all sorts of money to do the interlock.

01:40:44:10 – 01:41:24:04
Unknown
Well, before you even have to do it. At our law firm, we talk directly with our clients about which interlock company or companies to consider using, who to contact within those companies, which is huge. That resource of knowing who you can talk to and who will actually communicate with you between these interlock companies is night and day, and there are literally companies out there that will lie to you, that will not tell you correct information, that will specifically screw you over the companies we use that we direct our clients to as a resource, work very closely to make sure not only are you properly doing the application to get your ability to drive back as

01:41:24:04 – 01:41:48:14
Unknown
soon as remotely possible, but they’re helping you through that process, and they’re even helping you deal with situations that come up while you’re in the interlock, program. Furthermore, the actual physical equipment that they use is way better, and it is not created equal. Justin was describing some of the older type of equipment. I’ve had a lot of complaints from clients that this messed up my car, this screwed up my car.

01:41:48:14 – 01:42:13:28
Unknown
I had to spend all this money to get my car put back together, because the interlock company didn’t have a good device, or it had to get reset 20 different times, and I had to pay for that every single time. If you have a lawyer, talk to your lawyer. Use their knowledge. Use that as a resource to go to the right companies to do this in the most reasonable and easy way for you, and the least expensive way, and the way that’s going to get you the help.

01:42:14:00 – 01:42:32:17
Unknown
All right. Thanks so much for listening to this almost two hour long podcast this week. Now we defend. We have a blast doing this every week. We’ve got some good things coming up in the future. We have some ends that we’re working on. We’re going to be bringing in some new guests from different sectors of society.

01:42:32:19 – 01:42:49:04
Unknown
Obviously we’ve brought in former police or not former, but police officers in previous episodes. We’re going to continue to do that. But we have some other individuals that have reached out to us that are interested in coming on to our show. We’re going to be bringing them on soon, so stay tuned. Check us out every week. Look for the upcoming episodes.

01:42:49:06 – 01:43:04:17
Unknown
Again, check us out on our socials. We love the interaction on our socials. TikTok and Instagram have been really big linked in. We’re trying to promote that even more. Check us out on LinkedIn. And also on Facebook. It’s been a pleasure. Guys, have a great weekend or read great rest of the week. Take care.