Car Device That Keeps Drunks From Wheel Is Gaining Judges’ Favor

As a Municipal Court judge in North San Diego County, David Ryan was being asked to participate in a pilot program in which some drunk drivers would be ordered to put gadgets on their cars that would effectively prohibit them from driving if they had alcohol on their breath.

Ryan figured he would install the device--an ignition interlock--on his own car to see if it worked. It did, too well.

“One morning I breathed into the machine, and I couldn’t get my own car started. That kind of caught me by surprise,” Ryan said. “It turned out to be the mouthwash I had used.”

Ryan laughs off the incident now, and stands by the somewhat controversial device as perhaps the best way to keep convicted drunk drivers from repeating.

Introduced to State Last Summer

The instrument, introduced to California last summer by three companies, is designed to prohibit the driver of a car from turning on his ignition without first breathing into an under-the-dashboard breath analyzer to make sure his blood alcohol level isn’t above 0.03%--which amounts to about two drinks for most people. In California, a blood alcohol content of 0.10% is considered legally drunk.

If the driver can’t pass that test by blowing into the hand-held tube, the ignition remains locked. If he fails the first test, he must still breathe into the instrument with a predetermined pattern of breaths and pauses--a sort of signature that he is in fact the driver of the car.

The secondary test is designed to prohibit a drunk from having a buddy breathe into the device on his behalf. If, after three tries, the computer doesn’t accept the puff-and-pause protocol, the car’s ignition remains locked--even if the person passed the initial breath test.

Any driver failing at either the first or second step, can try again 15 minutes later--but each failure is noted in the instrument’s computer. The equipment is serviced and monitored by the manufacturer and if the driver has a court-imposed device, the technician is required to notify authorities of tinkering, attempted startups or other problems.

State legislation last year allowed judges to order the device installed in the cars of convicted drunk drivers. Three counties--San Diego, Alameda and Sonoma--are being monitored by the state Office of Traffic Safety to determine how effective the devices are.

While judges as a whole in the three pilot counties agreed to give the interlock device a try, some judges are nonetheless reluctant to order its use as a condition of probation when sentencing a drunk driver, for a variety of logistical and philosophical reasons:

- Some say the device, which costs about $500 a year to lease--is too expensive to impose on drivers. Other judges, however, sometimes reduce the amount of the accompanying drunk-driving fine to compensate for the cost of the device.

- Some judges say the device unfairly burdens other members of the family who might need to drive that same car, but must now pass the breath test themselves. Other judges respond, what’s wrong with that?

- Others complain that the machine may malfunction and unfairly penalize a sober driver, that the machine could be tinkered with and somehow bypassed, or that the driver may simply use another car to head for a bar or party. Proponents counter that the machines rarely fail, that the computer will show technicians whether it has been tampered with, and that the car’s odometer is monitored regularly to make sure it is still the primary vehicle of the driver.

“Sure, there are ways around the machine, like anything else,” Ryan said. “People from East Berlin still figure how to get to West Berlin.”

So Ryan, among others, is a firm believer that the device may be the most effective way yet to keep drunks off the road.

Not Enough Statistics

There are not yet enough statistics to effectively evaluate whether the gadgets are doing what they’re supposed to do, said Marilyn Sabin, the alcohol program manager for the Office of Traffic Safety. She’s hoping for a year’s extension of the pilot program to better study the results. But here’s how Ryan sees it, from the gut:

“I’ve reached the conclusion, after 15 years in this business, that we can’t effectively prevent the drunk from getting off a bar stool and driving home just by directing our attention at him . So, we’ve got to work on the drunk’s vehicle, by preventing the intoxicated person from even getting the car started.”

Other traditional sentencing tools available to judges for drunk drivers haven’t been too effective, most everyone argues, in teaching drunk drivers their lesson because they focus generally on punishment instead of behavior modification.

Repeat offenders usually face a fine, time in jail and a suspended license, in addition to being ordered to an alcohol rehabilitation program. But jail time may develop little more than a chip on the driver’s shoulder, and statistics indicate that 75% of the people with suspended licenses in California drive anyway.

For that reason, judges and defense attorneys say, the ignition interlock system seems to be hitting home with most drunk drivers who realize that, if they even take one stiff drink, a couple of beers or two glasses of wine, they may not be able to start their car and get back home or back to the office.

Consider Ryan’s experience, having had the device on his car for two months just to see how it worked.

“As you drive along, a little red light blinks to show the machine is working,” he said. “It’s like a constant reminder about drinking. When I’d go to a social function or a Chamber of Commerce event or to a (lawyers’) meeting, I just wouldn’t drink--even though usually I would have a drink. I was just too afraid that, when I went out to my car, it wouldn’t start and I wouldn’t be able to get home.”

‘Several Hundred’ in County

Betsey Meyer, state coordinator for Guardian Technologies, one of three distributors of interlock devices in California and the only provider of the device in San Diego County, estimates that “several hundred” of them have been installed in cars in San Diego County. Her company has installed “several thousand” elsewhere in the United States--including a sprinkling to car owners who install them, for about $500, to prevent their children from drinking and driving, she said.

Judges in San Diego County order 30 to 40 installed every month through her company, she estimated.

The judge most responsible for ordering their installations, she said, is San Diego Municipal Court Presiding Judge Ronald Domnitz, who says he orders about five drivers a week to have the device installed.

“I don’t know if it’s the answer, but it’s another impediment to drinking and driving, so I tend to use it,” Domnitz said. “And I haven’t seen anyone who’s had one in their car get arrested again for drunk driving.”

Reasons for Use

Domnitz said he usually orders the device installed if the driver is a repeat offender who violated an earlier probation order prohibiting him from drinking and driving, or if the person has fallen out of the state-sponsored alcohol counseling program. Other judges sometimes order the devices if the driver is a first-time offender but with a blood alcohol of 0.20 or higher, or if the driver is under 21.

“I offer (the device) as an alternative to suspending their license,” Domnitz said. “A few people say they’d rather have their license suspended. I guess some people decide they’ll violate the law (by driving without a license) and hope they don’t get caught.”

Michael Harris, Domnitz’s counterpart in Vista Municipal Court, says he is warming up to the device as a sentencing option.

“I wouldn’t have a problem, if the BA (blood alcohol) level is of a certain point, in making the device mandatory,” Harris said. “The technology is sufficiently developed to where it’s a safe and a good protector of society. I haven’t had any lawyers come back and say, ‘Hey, my guy lost his job because his car wouldn’t start due to this device.’ ”

Defense attorney David McKenzie of Vista is a big supporter of the instrument, even if his clients balk at it. “I think it’s a way to protect people from themselves. My clients don’t always agree with me,” he said.

McKenzie noted the case of a woman in her 50s who had been arrested for drunk driving four times in 20 years. “She was obviously a problem drinker, and she was facing a lot of time in custody for her most recent offense,” he said.

One judge insisted on sending her to jail for 120 days, but McKenzie found another judge willing, instead, to order the installation of the interlock.

“She’s complained the the machine wouldn’t work several times and she couldn’t get her car started, and she had to call a cab,” McKenzie said. “I don’t know if she simply wasn’t able to blow in it correctly, or if she actually had been drinking. She was complaining, but I think she should have been grateful.”

Attorney Disagrees

Another defense attorney, however, doesn’t see it the same.

“I think it’s bull . . . .” said Dan Cronin, an Escondido criminal defense lawyer. “It’s got malfunctioning problems, and it’s a pain . . . for other people who have to drive the car. And it’s not that difficult to get around.”

Still, Cronin acknowledged buying stock in the company that makes the instrument. “Something like this might work under the right circumstances,” he said.

State officials say they wish more judges would require the interlock, especially given the initial warm reception to it. Sabin said too many judges who at first endorsed the concept have since transferred to other courtrooms where they no longer regularly sentence drunk drivers, and their replacement judges need to be educated about the device.

One such judge who embraced interlock devices is Tony Maino, who was a municipal judge in Vista and now is on the Superior Court bench, where he no longer sees drunk drivers unless they are charged with felonies.

Maino is generally credited with being the interlock’s primary cheerleader in San Diego County. “The feedback I get from other judges and attorneys is that the drivers handle the device well, and that it’s actually responsible for changing their drinking behavior, and not just serving as punishment,” Maino said. “This may be the start of a technological step that one day may see the device as so unintrusive, it will be on all cars,” not unlike seat belts.

Even so, some drivers resist the gadget. Stories abound.

There was, for instance, the salesman who complained to a judge that having to blow into the tube before taking a client to lunch would embarrass him.

Another man reported to authorities that his interlock was stolen, perhaps by someone who mistook it for an under-dash cassette player.

Then there was the fellow who, fearing that he wouldn’t be able to restart his car after driving to a liquor store, left his auto idling in the parking lot.

It was stolen.