There are no winners or losers in the tragic case of Sandra Vasquez and the five teenagers who were killed in an accident involving her car.

This week, Vasquez was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the 2007 DUI accident. She had been giving eight teenagers a ride home from a late night party. At some point, she veered off the road and struck a utility pole. Five of the teenagers died, and the other three were injured. According to prosecutors, her blood-alcohol level at the time of the crash was .105, more than the legally allowed limit. Prosecutors also alleged that Vasquez had been speeding at the time of the crash.

Vasquez’s attorney has always held that the accuracy of the blood-alcohol tests was in question because Vasquez had suffered a damaged liver in the accident. She believes that this contributed to erroneous results. She was found guilty of reckless homicide and aggravated DUI in the crash.

Vasquez, herself the mother of two children, has expressed remorse for the accident. For what it was worth, the judge believed that her remorse was genuine, but held that her actions in driving the group of teenagers home while she herself was allegedly under the influence, demanded a lengthy prison sentence. The sentencing turned into an emotional affair with the parents and families of the five teenagers calling for stiff punishment.

Robert Stephenson is a Chicago DUI lawyer, whose practice is dedicated to the representation of persons accused of DUI and facing license suspension/revocation in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.

A strip club in Chicago has settled with the family of a pregnant woman, who was killed in a DUI-related accident involving a patron of the club.

Court records confirm a settlement between the Diamonds Gentlemen’s Club and the husband of April Simmons. The accident occurred in January 2006. At the time of the crash, Simmons was 27 years old, and pregnant. Her car was struck by a vehicle driven by John Homatas. Just a while before the crash, Homatas and his friend John Chiariello had been drinking at the club. A club employee found Homatas vomiting in the bathroom, and the two men were ejected from the facility. Bouncers at the club put the two men in Homatas’ car, and they drove off before they crashed into Simmons’ car few minutes later. Simmons, her unborn child and Chiariello were killed in the crash.

Diamonds Gentlemen’s Club argued that it was not responsible for the accident because it does not serve liquor. Gentlemen who visit the club, however, are allowed to bring in their liquor. However in March, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that the strip club did retain some responsibility for the accident.

In July, a settlement was reached between Simmons’ family and the club. Diamonds Gentlemen’s Club will now pay a $1 million settlement. Simmons family will receive $800,000 of the settlement, while the family of John Chiariello will receive $200,000. In 2007, Homatas was found guilty of aggravated DUI and reckless homicide and sentenced to 12 years in prison.

Robert Stephenson is a Chicago DUI lawyer, whose practice is dedicated to the representation of persons accused of DUI and facing license suspension and revocation in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has revealed the results of a survey conducted in 2008. According to the survey, approximately 17 million Americans above the age of 16 admitted to drunk driving over the past 12 months. The agency has released the survey results in time for its annual “Drunk Driving. Over the Limit. Under Arrest.” anti-DUI Labor Day crackdown.

Approximately 7,000 American motorists were included in the survey. About 8% of them admitted to driving with a blood alcohol level above the legal limit, at least once over the previous year. Besides, an additional 8% admitted to having been a passenger in a car driven by an intoxicated driver.

Across the state of Illinois, law enforcement agencies are participating in the annual Labor Day holiday crackdown against drunk driving. Law enforcement agencies look at major American holidays as open season on drunk drivers. If you are planning to drive during the Labor Day holiday, you must know that there will be an increased concentration of sobriety checkpoints and patrols.

During major holidays, the city of Chicago is under additional pressure to present a high DUI arrest tally. There’s plenty of focus on a higher DUI arrest and citation score. That means your chances of being arrested for DUI increase dramatically during major holidays. It’s also why Chicago DUI lawyers are extra busy during the Fourth of July, New Year’s Eve and Labor Day.

If you plan to drink during the holiday, plan to have someone drive you home after the party, or stay overnight, so you can avoid being pulled over.

While crime rates across the country have dropped over the past 15 years, the number of prisoners has actually increased. A study that analyzed crime data from Chicago finds that concentration of incarceration in a few hotspots creates a vicious cycle, where resentment and frustration contribute to further imprisonment.

Harvard University sociology professor Robert Sampson and graduate student Charles Loeffler reported the findings of the study this month at a press conference at the American Sociology Association meeting. According to the two, most incarceration in the country is concentrated in just a few low-income, predominantly black and disadvantaged communities. Crime data for Chicago between 1990 and 1995 shows that most prison inmates came from these disadvantaged, mostly black neighborhoods. The fact that most prison arrests are traced to these communities fosters an atmosphere of suspicion, distrust and resentment, which adds to more people from these neighborhoods filling up prisons. It’s a vicious cycle, and one that Chicago criminal defense lawyers have been aware of.

There is a silver lining, the two researchers believe. With prison populations exploding, states left with few resources to take care of these people, are being forced to look at other programs that can reduce prison populations. In Hawaii, new program targets men who have been placed on probation and are considered likely to commit an offense again. These men are put through random drug tests, and have to undergo a short prison stay for an offense. These programs have been found to significantly deter men from committing crimes again. The cost of running a program like this that can keep persons out of prison, is just about $3,000 per person per year. Compare that to the $30,000 it costs to accommodate a person in prison for a year.

Between 1990 and 1995, even as rates of overall crime in Chicago decreased, the number of prisoners from the economically disadvantaged sections of Chicago increased. According to researchers, they interviewed about 3,000 residents of these areas in 1995 and 2002, and found serious resentment and lack of hope about the situation. Most of them expected to be in prison by the age of 25.

Instead of filling prisons with people who have no choices, we should be offering these people better choices that can decongest our prisons, keep crime rates down and keep our streets safe.

The nationwide campaign to require the installation of ignition interlock devices in all vehicles owned and operated by DUI convicts, has had New York jumping enthusiastically onto the bandwagon. A provision of a New York law that requires persons convicted of felony or DUI to install ignition interlock devices in all their vehicles, went into effect this month.

The provision is part of Leandra’s Law, which makes a DUI a felony if a person is driving under the influence with a child in the car. The ignition interlock device provision went into effect on August 15, and under the new law, motorists in New York who are convicted for driving under the influence, will have to install the device. This device is connected to the ignition system of their car. The device will detect alcohol on the motorist, and automatically disable the ignition if alcohol is detected, preventing the driver from driving.

DUI offenders will have to keep the devices installed for a minimum of six months, and a max of three years for a misdemeanor. For a felony DUI conviction, the maximum number of years that the device is to be installed, is five years.

The day after the much-vaunted law went into effect, a woman from Liverpool, New York, became the first motorist in the state to have the ignition interlock device installed in her car as part of the new law. She had been convicted of driving under the influence with a child in the car. The woman has no other record of being arrested for DUI, but because she had been driving under the influence with a child in the vehicle, she automatically gets a felony DUI on her record.

There is nothing in the law that states how law-enforcement plans to crack down on persons with ignition interlock devices in their vehicles, who simply borrow or rent vehicles instead. This law will have ignition device makers laughing all the way to the bank.

Robert Stephenson is a Chicago DUI lawyer, whose criminal law practice is dedicated to the representation of persons accused of DUI, and facing license suspensions in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.

Chicago police is using a “predictive policing” tool in order to fight crime in the city. The Chicago Police Department is working together with the Illinois Institute of Technology and the Rand Corporation on the project that is apparently designed to help officers crack down on crime by predicting crime beforehand. The National Institute of Justice is funding $200,000 towards the project.

It’s not as futuristic as it sounds. The procedure is called predictive analysis, and it makes use of computerized tools to analyze criminal activity in order to identify any future criminal activity. Researchers from the Illinois Institute of technology will analyze the data that the police provide.

Police officers will use computer models with constantly updated information of criminal activity in order to analyze the criminal mind, and respond effectively to new crime situations. Under the new model, criminal activity information is analyzed on a daily basis, and not every week or every month. The Chicago police department is using a combination of these computerized tools with human intelligence activity, to deal with crime over the summer.

Police officers still have no idea how successful predictive policing and predictive analysis will be in preventing crime in Chicago.

Robert Stephenson is a Chicago criminal defense lawyer, whose criminal law practice is dedicated to the representation of persons accused of drug crimes, DUI, homicide and other crimes in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.

Our client had been arrested and charged with driving under the influence, and improper lane usage. Pursuant to Illinois law, our client had received a statutory summary suspension of his driving privileges for 6 months. Before the suspension of his license went into effect, Attorneys Blaine and Stephenson obtained the reversal of the suspension of our client’s license. Today, after a bench trial, our client was found not guilty on both counts: driving under the influence and improper lane usage.

Illinois DUI Laws: DUI Arrest

Being pulled over by a police officer can be unnerving, even if you haven’t had an ounce to drink.  Add a drink or two into the mix, and this experience can be downright intimidating.  It is often helpful to know the procedure for a DUI arrest, so that you can be prepared for what might occur.

To begin, an officer may stop your vehicle at a roadside sobriety check point, or for reasonable suspicion, probable cause, or unusual operation.  These are legal terms which your Chicago DUI lawyer can explain in more detail, but, essentially, they mean that the officer must have some sort of reason to pull you over.  If this happens, find a safe place to pull over, and try to remain calm.

Once stopped, the police officer will generally come to the driver’s side window, and ask for your driver’s license, proof of insurance, and vehicle registration.  It is helpful to keep your insurance and registration in the glove box of your car, for easy access.  Remember to be as polite and respectful as possible.  Being rude will not help your chances!

As mentioned before, you may be asked to submit to a field sobriety test under Illinois DUI laws if the police officer thinks you may have been drinking.  If you have been drinking, you should decline this test, and tell the officer that you would like to remain silent, and would like to speak with your Chicago DUI lawyer.

If the officer has probable cause that you have been drinking, you may be placed under arrest for DUI, and taken to the police station.  If you are taken to the police station, you should request to speak to your Chicago DUI lawyer before any additional tests are done, and you should not answer any questions posed by the officers.

In order to leave the police station, you may be required to post bond.  Your Chicago DUI lawyer can help you with this.  After leaving the station, it may be helpful for you to write down everything you remember about the evening, including how much you had to drink, how the officer behaved, what you said to the officer, whether you were read your Miranda rights (“You have the right to remain silent….etc.”)  Even if something doesn’t seem important, write it down.  Your Chicago DUI lawyer can help you to determine whether any of the events are relevant to your case.

Finally, your vehicle may be towed, seized, or impounded.  If this happens, you may want to contact your Chicago DUI lawyer for help.

The Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists released its 2008 statistics for the Illinois Police Departments with the most DUI arrests:

The Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists revealed its list of the Police officers with the most DUI arrests in Illinois: