I personally have seen countless situations where clients got severely burned by hiring a lawyer who did not specialize in Massachusetts DUI defense.

Putting your drunk driving case in the hands of a lawyer who is not a Mass. DUI specialist can have terrible and life-long consequences.

In one situation, for example, the police used the wrong breathalyzer refusal rights form and misadvised the defendant regarding the consequences of his license suspension. With the right lawyer, he could have completely reversed the breathalyzer refusal suspension. However, once he contacted me, it was too late to appeal and he lost his license for life! This lifetime revocation was completely avoidable.

In other cases, unsuspecting DUI defendants have listened to bad advice and unknowingly triggered 4 year habitual traffic offender revocations, because they plead out when they should have fought the DUI charges. In those cases, they thought they were getting only a 45 day loss of license. Instead, they got a 45 day loss of license plus a 4 year habitual traffic offender revocation. 

In some other DUI cases, the lawyer was too quick to advise the client to plead out to a potentially winning DUI case. The burden is on the prosecution to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. This is a high standard and a good DUI lawyer is able to find and exploit weaknesses in the prosecution’s case. Potential weaknesses include lack of reasonable suspicion for the DUI stop, improper reliance on an anonymous tip, improperly conducted field sobriety tests, problems with the administration of the breath test or accuracy of the breathalyzer, innocent explanations for alleged deficient performance of field sobriety tests, common sense explanations for what the police construe as signs and symptoms of alcohol intoxication, to name a few. 

If your license and maintaining a clean criminal record are important to you, it is critical to hire a Natick MA DUI defense lawyer who has a proven track record of getting not guilty verdicts and charges dismissed. Too many lawyers “dabble” in DUI instead of specializing. Most of these lawyers make mistakes and are ill equipped to effectively defend those accused of drunk driving.  The Massachusetts Appeals Court has stated that wading through the various provisions of the Massachusetts DUI law “is akin to driving a car without windshield wipers on a dirt road on the side of a mountain at night during a blizzard.” Therefore, a hiring the right Mass. DUI lawyer is critical.

IN-DEPTH KNOWLEDGE OF MASS. DUI LAWS IS CRUCIAL TO SUCCESS

Successful defending someone charged with operating under the influence in Massachusetts begins with a thorough knowledge of the laws governing not only DUI but also search & seizure, stops, arrests, bookings, anonymous tips, field sobriety testing, custodial questioning, and the like. Natick Massachusetts DWI attorneys must also be thoroughly familiar with the complex Massachusetts breath testing regulations, the Mass. Rules of Criminal Procedure, district court operations, and the related body of decisional law.

Because of the knowledge required for successful DUI defense, the best lawyers are true DUI defense specialists, as opposed to general practitioners who handle DUI cases in between divorces, personal injury cases, and real estate closings.

Attorneys George McCarthy, Jeanne Koehr, Brian Simoneau, Paul Watkins have an in-depth knowledge of Massachusetts DUI laws, breathalyzer admissibility requirements, and the laws governing motor vehicle stops and the probable cause required for a drunk driving arrest in Massachusetts. Put this specialized OUI defense knowledge to work for you.