Back in January, we covered Utah and its new DUI law that lowered their blood alcohol content limit to 0.05 percent. (Utah Now Has the Lowest BAC Limit in the Country)
FOX13 of Salt Lake City did a deep dive into new DUI statistics in Utah since the new law’s start. It was reported by the Utah Department of Public Safety that of the 844 people who had been arrested statewide and 38 of them were arrested for having a blood alcohol concentration of between 0.05 and 0.079.
FOX13 took it a step further and broke down the numbers within the 38 who were arrested.
- 7 were found to be under the legal age of drinking
- 24 were alcohol restricted drivers and had previously been arrested for a DUI
- 2 were arrested with a combination of drugs, either prescription or illegal, in their system along with alcohol
- 1 refused a field sobriety test or chemical blood draw, the results which were positive after a warrant was issued
- 4 were arrested with the BAC being the only issue with the results between 0.05 and 0.079
Interestingly, the number of underage drinking violations do not show a change prevalence and, according to Michele Corgliano of the Salt Lake Are Restaurant Association, the breakdown and its supporting numbers show that the majority of the DUI arrests are not of drivers who registered a BAC that fell within the new lowered range.
“These results are in line with our stand prior to the law: 33 of these arrests would have been illegal under the previous law: underage drinking, drugs, suspended license, etc. This is in line with our research, in that it does NOT show .05 is the reason for impairment,” Corgliano said to FOX13.
The average time it takes for the labs to return with the toxicology results to confirm blood alcohol contents is approximately 60 days. Therefore, we have yet to find out if the more recent months show a similar trend. However, since the time that the new law had been implemented, it seems that most of the arrests were for violations of DUI laws that were already in place before the new 0.05 DUI limit took effect. It may still be too early to make any deductions, but if this trend continues, the effectiveness of the new law could face some scrutiny.
Supporters of the 0.05 DUI law have been focused on the reduction of the crashes, injuries, and deaths, noting that it was never about the number of the arrests, but rather saving more lives from the act of driving under the influence. While that may or may not be true, we do not yet have the numbers of injuries and deaths since the implementation of the new law to determine if this law is making a difference. And having said that, I’m sure they’re not crying that at least some people were arrested under the new lowered BAC limit.
Other states such as California have been contemplating following in Utah’s footsteps and lowering their legal limit from 0.08 percent to 0.05 percent. It will be interesting to see if California lawmakers take into account the numbers that Utah produces before making a decision. Given the aforementioned statistics for Utah’s new law, and if the current trend of seeming ineffectiveness continues, I certainly hope that California takes Utah’s numbers into account.
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