After a long flight, landing at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is stressful enough. After visiting restaurant, hotel and shopping hubs, many business travelers and visitors will be keen to get to the rental car hub to grab a car and drive to their final destination. But when you’re rolling around in a couple of drinks along the way or taking a little R&R at the airport before you hit the ground, this smooth cutover can easily turn into a legal headache. The surrounding roads to the airport rental car center are often confusing, and many drivers, sober, make a sudden lane change or do some crazy thing. These navigation errors to a patrolling police officer appear just like impaired driving, often leading into a traffic stop and an instant demand for an Atlanta DUI Attorney.
The way the physical structure of Hartsfield-Jackson rental car hub looks when someone leaves is a recipe for errors. They’re required to follow the directions on the GPS, which frequently does not correspond to the actual traffic lane changes, while trying to deal with sudden forks, poorly lit signs and rapid lane merges onto high-speed interstates. Add this confusion to travel fatigue, dehydration and jet lag and it is easy for a driver’s demeanor to resemble that of a drunk. Eye redness from an extended flight and slight stumble from stiff joints after many hours on a cramped airplane seat often are mistaken by police for impairment when conducting a field sobriety test. If you’re out of town and find yourself in this position, hiring a DUI Attorney in Atlanta with experience in these circumstances is imperative to your defense.
An arrest in the immediate vicinity of the airport creates a huge problem with jurisdiction. Hartsfield-Jackson is located at a strategic geographic intersection where the boundaries of several counties and cities meet. Depending on where the law enforcement officer began the traffic stop—whether it be on an airport return ramp, one of the perimeter roads, or on a nearby interstate exit—your case may end up in the City of Atlanta Municipal Court, Clayton County State Court, or even involve federal property boundaries. All of these court systems have different rules, procedures, prosecutors, etc. This paper-pushing process calls for a savvy DUI Attorney Atlanta who can ensure evidence—including footage from the airport security cameras and police dashcams—is collected from the proper agencies before it’s removed.
The defense must be strong enough to identify any shortcomings in the prosecution’s case to defend a charge that begins at the airport rental location. Attorney James Yeargan is well versed in how to respond to an officer’s allegations of operating a vehicle unsafely. It can be extremely effective to establish a road design that causes erratic driving behavior even when a driver is sober, which we call a “defensive” approach. Through the use of traffic studies, airport road maps and rental records, your lawyer will be able to show that your sudden lane changes were the logical result of the confusion caused by the signs, and not chemical impairment. In addition, travel logs, flight plans and boarding passes may be admitted to confirm that the physical symptoms (bloodshot eyes, slow reaction, etc.) were the direct result of exhaustion and not the result of drinking.
If you are an out-of-state driver, two things can happen when you are arrested in Georgia: (1) your driver’s license can be suspended or revoked on the scene and (2) your driving privileges in your home state can also be suspended or revoked under the Interstate Driver License Compact (IDLC). If you don’t complete the administrative license suspension paperwork within the time limits set by the state of Georgia, the suspension may be permanent and will follow you wherever you go, including your job and your personal life. For this reason, it is important to hire a dedicated DUI Lawyer Atlanta professionals can rely on to fight in court and get you back home to your family and job. You can save yourself a ton of costs and stress by having your attorney attend court for you at an early stage for preliminary hearings, as they can represent you in court and argue your case.
