A Texas gubernatorial candidate’s wife, Angela Graham-West, was arrested for suspicion of DUI. The responding officer stated he witnessed the vehicle swerving. When he pulled her over, he smelled a faint odor of alcohol and observed bloodshot, watery eyes. He asked her to step out of the car where he conducted field sobriety tests. According to the officer, she failed portions of the field sobriety tests. The officer said the portable breath test was having issues ascertaining a reading. She was taken to a local hospital for a blood draw. Initially, she consented, but later recanted her consent causing the officer to obtain a warrant to draw her blood.
As of today, the blood results are not back, but Ms. Graham-West’s lawyers are arguing that she did not consume alcohol prior to being pulled over, she has an eye condition that affected the performance on the horizontal gaze nystagmus test, and she submitted to an independent urine test that showed she did not consume alcohol in the past 80 hours.
Although this is a Texas DUI, and our attorneys are only licensed in Arizona, there are quite a few facts of this case that we would use to attack an Arizona DUI. Officers routinely lie about the performance of field sobriety tests. I have represented thousands of clients for DUI cases. I don’t know why field sobriety tests are even administered. It is impossible to pass them, alcohol or no alcohol. People are nervous, scared and have never performed any similar tests. You would have to be a professional acrobat under extremely comfortable conditions to successfully pass these tests.
As you can see, there’s a good chance this lady did not have alcohol in her system, yet the police fabricated facts to support their arrest. This is a prime example of why you need a skilled lawyer to challenge every aspect of your DUI. Unfortunately, we live in a society where the absence of a quality defense lawyer means an innocent person could go to jail