Driving under the influence of drugs - discontinued

Case study summary

Our client was stopped by police who could smell cannabis and alcohol inside of the vehicle. He was subsequently charged with driving whilst unfit. We challenged this decision in light of forensic evidence and the prosecution withdrew the charge at his plea hearing.

Case study

Our client was a man charged with driving whilst unfit through drink or drugs. The police had questioned him in the first instance because he failed to carry out a successful parallel park at the side of the road. Whilst being questioned, the police could smell alcohol and cannabis emanating from the vehicle. Accordingly he was arrested and taken to the police station for a blood and fitness to drive test. The legal limit for driving under the influence of drugs is significantly less than alcohol as drug consumption is generally outside the permissions of the law.

The challenge in this case was to test the evidence around the amount of drugs present in his system at the time his blood was taken, and establish that the level of drugs at the time of his arrest was within acceptable limits and did not render him unfit to drive. Our client had 1.3ug/L THC of cannabis in his system and the legal limit is 2. The limit set is extremely low and way below the acceptable limits of alcohol. If he had consumed any cannabis at all shortly before he was arrested he would have failed the blood test.

After listening to our client's account of the event and careful consideration of the forensic evidence, it became clear that this matter should not have been charged. The prosecution made a great deal of his poor performance of a FIT test, which they say supported the assertion he was unfit to drive. At court but prior to the plea hearing, the defence advocate made representations to the Crown Prosecution Service that the evidence did not support our client being unfit to drive through drugs, and that his poor performance in the FIT test could not be connected to the tiny amount of drugs present in his system. Accordingly the prosecutor withdrew the charge and our client was overwhelmed with relief.