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If you have a first or second DUI offense, you will have to do a series of educational classes that is about 12.5 hours. Historically, you did these in a classroom environment here in York at a provider like Wellspan or New Insights. Now, due to covid-19, York County will accept local defendants doing online DUI classes. How can you do this?

Pennsylvania briefly abandoned the warrant requirement for vehicle searches following a messy decision in Comm. v. Gary. Today, in a case that is seismic in importance to criminal law in Pennsylvania, the PA Supreme Court requires police to have both probable cause and exigent circumstances in order to search a vehicle without a warrant. The practical consequence is that most vehicle searches will now require a warrant to be legal. Here is the entire 55 page decision. 

This post talks about the date you are eligible for an interlock for a second offense DUI. PennDOT's letters and communications in this area are unbelievably bad, and they frequently confuse and upset my clients. I've answered this specific question two times in the last two weeks in different forms, so I am sure others have the same concerns.

One of the benefits of practicing in York, Pennsylvania, is that the local newspaper, the York Daily Record, employs Dylan Segelbaum. His reporting on issues of crime and the courts is really excellent. A while back, he reached out to a number of people to dig into a claiming indicator of drugged driving: the infamous "green tongue." The result was this really excellent and well-researched article. There is video, too, and I get some facetime in it. It is definitely worth the time to read it.

The CRN is an important step mandated in DUI cases in Pennsylvania. It is also a mandatory step to take if you want to participate in the ARD program in York County, Pennsylvania. What is it, though?

Anyone who enters the ARD program in York County, Pennsylvania for a DUI is required to attend a "victim impact panel" as part of their ARD program requirements. Covid-19 has altered how this is done now compared to past years.

When you are placed into the ARD program in York County, Pennsylvania, you typically have to do 35 hours of community service. There is a program to allow you to reduce your total hours to just 20 instead of 35.

As recently as a few years ago, you had to immediately turn in your driver's license when you went to court to be placed into the ARD program for a DUI in York County, Pennsylvania. That isn't the way it works anymore, and now you have an option to get an ignition interlock license so you can drive. People call this a "blow and go" sometimes. How does this work?

As York County said "goodbye" to 2019 and welcomed in 2020, residents did not experience any DUI checkpoints. The usual spots - North George Street in North York Borough across from the cemetery, the I-83 connector between York Hospital and I-83, Route 30 out along the bypass -- all of them were unmanned, and motorists were not stopped and evaluated for impairment.  Why not?

You can have more than one DUI under Pennsylvania and have it be treated as a first offense. I'm writing this today because people get confused over what is a "lifetime offense" and what is a "prior offense". I had to answer this question twice today, actually.

The simple version is this: if you were sentenced on a DUI more than ten years before you were charged with a new DUI offense, the new DUI offense will be treated as a first offense. There's a lot more to it than that, so click through for more details.