How Can You Prevent Your Driver's License from Being Suspended if You Were Arrested for DUI in Palm Beach, Florida?

If you were arrested for DUI and you refused to blow into a breath machine, your driver's license will be suspended for 1 year if that is the first time you refused to blow into the machine. If you have refused more than once, your license will be suspended for 18 months.

What if you didn't refuse to blow into the breath machine but instead blew over the legal limit of 0.08? Your license will be suspended for 6 months unless your license was previously suspended for blowing over 0.08. In that case, your license will be suspended for 1 year.

Is there anything you can do to prevent your license from being suspended? Yes. Request what is called a formal review hearing. You do that by going to an office called the Bureau of Administrative Reviews and requesting such a hearing. But you have to make a written request within 10 days of when your license was suspended for either refusing to blow into the breath machine or else blowing over the legal limit. If you do not request a hearing within those 10 days, you will not be able to have a hearing.

Once you have requested a hearing, you (or your lawyer) should send a subpoena to the officer who arrested you telling him that he must appear at that hearing in order to explain such things as why he stopped your car in the first place and what evidence he has that you were driving under the influence of alcohol. If the police officer's answers to those questions are unsatisfactory to the person in charge of conducting the hearing, that person has the power to reverse the suspension of your driver's license and give you back your license.

If you have been arrested for DUI in Palm Beach, West Palm Beach, St. Lucie County, Martin County, Palm Beach County, Broward County, or Miami-Dade County, call me, attorney Ron Chapman, at 561-832-4348 so that we can discuss your case and see how I might be able to help you.