About 20,000 Florida drivers convicted of DUI after June 2002 will have to buy the equipment.
By STEVE BOUSQUET
Published December 17, 2003
TALLAHASSEE - Thousands of Florida motorists convicted of driving drunk will soon face a new obstacle to getting back on the road: the ignition interlock device.
Those drivers will not be able to start their cars if their blood alcohol level is higher than 0.05 percent. Florida law presumes drivers to be impaired when their blood alcohol level eaches 0.08 percent.
The cars must be equipped with a device about the size of a cell phone that takes a breath sample. Drivers will pay about $75 for the device, plus maintenance fees of about $65 a month.
"There's a heightened awareness that we're trying to get out to the motoring public: It is not cool to drink and drive," said Fred Dickinson, executive director of the state Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.
Prodded by a federal requirement, Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet on Tuesday approved use of the devices, beginning Feb. 1. But the devices will apply to anyone convicted of DUI since July 1, 2002. That covers about 20,000 drivers.
The Legislature passed a law in 2002 requiring the interlocks. The program was delayed by a lengthy dispute between competing bidders to install the devices. So the state created two geographical areas, north and south, and awarded contracts to two companies.
LifeSafer Interlock won the contract for the northern half of the state, including Citrus and Hernando counties. Alcohol Countermeasure Systems Corp. will provide interlocks to the southern half of the state, including Pinellas, Hillsborough and Pasco counties.
Andy Hindman, state executive director of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the interlocks should diminish the number of repeat DUI offenders who keep driving after their licenses have been suspended or revoked.
"We believe it's going to make Florida's highways much safer," Hindman said. "One of our real challenges in Florida has been with repeat offenders. The interlock device is going to be able to monitor folks who continue to drive."
Through Sunday, 2,884 people had died in traffic accidents in Florida in 2003. The state estimates about a third of those accidents involved alcohol.
The interlocks will be required on certain categories of DUI offenders who have applied to have their licenses reinstated.
First-time DUI offenders will be required to have the devices for up to six months if their blood-alcohol count was above 0.20 percent or they had a child in the vehicle at the time of the offense. Interlocks also will be required for one year for drivers with two DUI convictions and for two years for drivers with three DUI convictions.
Lawyers who specialize in DUI law say judges have been ordering the purchase of the devices for months.
Frank Russo, a St. Petersburg defense lawyer who specializes in DUI cases, said he has represented numerous defendants who have been required to buy an interlock, including one Tuesday afternoon in Pinellas County.
Russo operates a Web site, floridaignitioninterlocks.com, which provides information on how the program works in Florida. He said judges will reinstate driving privileges, subject to revocation if a driver does not buy the device in a specified period of time.
"My review of the studies tends to suggest that the device does, in fact, lessen the incidence of consuming alcohol and then operating a motor vehicle," Russo said. Some motorists, he said, will still evade the law by driving drunk without a license.
"Just because the law requires installation of the device does not mean that everybody is going to comply," Russo said.
Florida joins 42 other states that already have passed some form of an interlock program in response to federal legislation adopted in 1998. Congress has threatened to withhold some road construction money from states that fail to require the interlock devices.
A Pennsylvania study released early this year found that breath-alcohol detectors prevented tipsy drivers from getting on the highway more than 10,000 times.
Before 2002, a judge could require an interlock device, but it was optional. Among the many possible driving restrictions listed on the back of a Florida driver license is the category known as P, for "probation interlock device."
- Times researcher Kitty Bennett contributed to this report.
