Posted on April 04, 2019 in Uncategorized

It seems like there has been an explosion in the number of stores that sell hemp & CBD products in the Houston area overnight. Simply put, an important federal law changed the definition of hemp products, de-listing them from the Controlled Substances Act and legalizing many of them but not all of them.

Unfortunately, the new regulations are far from clear, and a misstep can lead to a serious charge of drug possession or even drug distribution.

What is Hemp?

Hemp is a fibrous and oily plant that is often confused with marijuana because it comes from the same species of plants. However, certain types of hemp plants have very low levels of THC – the active ingredient in marijuana that makes it illegal – and much higher levels of cannabidiol, a chemical that reduces the psychoactive effects of the existing THC.

Hemp has lots of uses. Its fibrous material has been used to make textiles, clothing, and even rope, while the cannabidiol in hemp can be infused in foods and drinks and is supposed to help alleviate a wide variety of medical conditions from nausea to chronic pain to PTSD, though scientific evidence is lacking.

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 Posted on April 04, 2019 in Uncategorized

A driver in Houston is being charged with a felony-level offense of driving while intoxicated (DWI) after she allegedly caused an accident that ended in a fatality. The charges are for intoxication manslaughter, an allegation that can lead to a steep jail sentence in Harris County, Texas, if it ends with a conviction.

Multi-Car Pileup Leads to DWI Arrest in Houston

The incident happened during the late night hours of Friday, April 5, 2019.

According to the initial reports, there was a car accident on the Katy Freeway near exit 766 that stopped traffic on the highway just after three in the morning. Another vehicle traveling on the Katy Freeway, however, did not stop in time upon nearing the congested traffic. The driver slammed into another car, which created a chain reaction that ended up involving four vehicles.

The driver apparently tried fleeing the scene of the crash, but was quickly apprehended by police. She was brought to the hospital for leg injuries sustained in the crash, where she was determined to be under the influence.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

A fatal accident in Houston involving a drunk driver is an excellent example of how a single incident of driving while intoxicated (DWI) can quickly amass numerous criminal allegations, each one more severe than the last.

Drunk Driver in Fatal Crash With Lyft Car

On March 1, 2019, a 21-year-old driver ran through an intersection and hit a Lyft vehicle. The Lyft passenger was killed in the collision. The driver was seriously hurt with life-threatening injuries that have put him in a coma.

When police responded to the scene, the driver admitted to having several shots of tequila before getting into his car. Blood alcohol content (BAC) tests found him to be more than three times over the legal limit.

Prosecutors are now charging the driver with intoxication assault for hurting the Lyft driver as well as intoxication manslaughter for killing the passenger. Those charges come on top of the underlying charge for DWI.

Intoxication Assault in Houston

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

While details of the incident are still sketchy, reports indicate that a suspected drunk driver hit a police patrol car near Pinehurst, just north of Houston. If the deputy is found to have sustained a serious bodily injury, then the fact that he was in the line of duty could drastically elevate the penalties of a conviction from a regular offense to a felony crime on par with murder.

Police Deputy Hit by Suspected Drunk Driver

The incident happened in Montgomery County during the night of March 9 and early morning of March 10, 2019. According to the initial reports, a police deputy from Montgomery County Precinct 5 was on traffic duty, closing lanes of State Highway 249 near the town of Pinehurst so construction crews could work on the road.

While closing the lanes, a pickup truck slammed into deputy's patrol car – which had its emergency lights on at the time – propelling the car almost 100 feet. The pickup truck driver kept driving through the construction zone until he went off the road and into a ditch.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

In theory, at least, laws are supposed to reflect the interests, concerns, and views of the people behind them. In a representative democracy like the one we have in the U.S., that should mean that the laws we have on our books – especially the criminal laws – reflect what we think is important in life.

So it is interesting to see that the laws in Texas that prohibit intoxication assault and intoxication manslaughter carry the exact same penalties if the victim of the crash caused by driving while intoxicated (DWI) dies from their injuries or was put into a permanent vegetative state.

Criminal Laws are a Reflection of Our Worries and Fears

It is probably the most fascinating aspect of criminal law: The things and the actions that we condemn as criminal are also the things that we fear the most. Differences between sets of criminal laws – especially those from different cultures – highlight the concerns that people have and what kind of government they live in. For example, Saudi Arabia is a theocratic government where alcohol is entirely prohibited by their religious law. DWI offenses, therefore, can result in huge fines, up to ten years in jail, and even lashes in public.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

Police have cleared two bars in Houston of wrongdoing related to a fatal accident involving a driver who was driving while intoxicated (DWI). While the driver is facing felony DWI charges including intoxication manslaughter and intoxication assault, no charges have been filed under the state's dram shop laws.

Fatal DWI Crash in Houston

The situation all began on March 1, 2019. According to reports, the driver of a Dodge pickup truck ran into the back of a Mazda pickup truck stopped at a red light at the intersection of Galveston Road and Pineloch Drive in Houston. The crash pushed the Mazda pickup truck into another car, a Lyft vehicle.

The backseat passenger in the Lyft vehicle was killed in the crash, while the Lyft driver was critically injured.

The driver of the Dodge pickup truck was found to have a blood alcohol content (BAC) of.216. He was arrested for DWI and charged with intoxication manslaughter for the Lyft passenger killed in the crash. He was also charged with intoxication assault for the injured Lyft driver, though the penalties on that charge could be identical to the manslaughter charge because the Lyft driver is still in a coma.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

The Houston police officer behind the botched drug raid in the Pecan Hills neighborhood had a suspicious history of sloppy police work, according to local news reports. The fact that he was allowed to continue conducting "investigations" that led to search warrants in spite of all of these red flags shows that the problem is systemic and not just confined to this particular officer.

Reports Show Officer Routinely Made Evidentiary Missteps

According to a report by KHOU 11 in Houston, the police officer responsible for initiating the drug raid that ended up killing two suspects and wounding several officers had a long history of red flags related to his work with evidence. Much of that work involved reporting the evidence that spawned a search warrant – one of the very first stages of a drug investigation.

According to the report, out of 109 search warrant cases that officer Goines led, an astonishing 20 percent of them ended up being dismissed for lack of probable cause or other issues related to the sufficiency of the evidence. That means that one in five of officer Goines' search warrants could not be backed up or supported with evidence. Additionally, 12 percent of the search warrants obtained by Goines' work led to drug busts of a different kind of drug.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

With a new case for driving while intoxicated (DWI) making its way to the Supreme Court of the United States, it is helpful to review where we are in DWI law to fully understand the implications of the new case, State v. Mitchell.

Much of the newest developments in DWI law have dealt with implied consent laws, and how they have gotten out of hand.

A Quick Review of Implied Consent Laws

Implied consent laws are statutes that penalize the act of refusing to perform a chemical test for your blood alcohol content (BAC), like a breathalyzer or a blood test. These laws imply your consent to a BAC test every time you use your driver's license to drive on the road. Because they are tied to your license, the only penalties that you can face for refusing a BAC test and violating the implied consent law is an automatic license suspension.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

Houston police have opened their ongoing investigation surrounding a fatal accident last June to the media. According to the police, the driver in that fatal crash was driving while intoxicated (DWI) but was not arrested. Police have now charged him with three counts of intoxication assault, one count of intoxication manslaughter, as well as other DWI offenses, and want to spread the word of the investigation in order to find the suspect.

Intoxication Charges filed Nine Months Later

The accident that has spawned the investigation happened at 10 p.m. on June 8, 2018, in northwestern Houston. According to the police reports, a Ford F-150 was northbound on Wirt Road. At the intersection with Hammerly Boulevard, the driver turned left on a flashing yellow light. A Honda Civic with three children in the car was in the southbound lane. The pickup truck hit the Civic head-on.

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 Posted on March 03, 2019 in Uncategorized

In a recent blog post, we looked at the last time the Supreme Court of the United States talked about the law of driving while intoxicated (DWI): The case Birchfield v. North Dakota. That case dealt with an important topic that will return to the Court in a pending DWI case, State v. Mitchell: the need for police to either secure a warrant before searching for evidence of a DWI crime or justify their warrantless search by showing it fell within one of the six exceptions to the warrant requirement.

The Fourth Amendment, Searches, and Warrants

Simply put, you have a Fourth Amendment right to be free from searches by law enforcement that are "unreasonable." Searches are presumed to be "unreasonable" – and therefore in violation of your rights – if police do not have a warrant.

However, if the police show that their search fell into any of the six exceptions to the warrant requirement, then their search becomes "reasonable" and therefore permissible, in spite of their lack of a warrant.

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