Regardless of whether you are ever charged with DUI, you will be facing an administrative license suspension from the Department of Licensing. The length of the suspension will depend upon whether you have prior administrative suspensions and whether you refused to submit to a breath test.
The arresting officer may have punched a hole in your license prior to leaving the police station. This does not mean that your ability to drive has been restricted. Your license is still valid and you can continue to drive pending further action as described below.
You can, and should, request a hearing to contest the administrative suspension. You do so by filling out the Hearing Request Form that should have been provided to you by the arresting officer and mailing it to the Department of Licensing within thirty days of the date of the arrest. Unless you are indigent, you must include a check or money order for $200 made out to the Department of Licensing.
If you request a hearing, the Department of Licensing must give you one within sixty days of the date of the arrest. The hearing will be presided over by a Department of Licensing representative. Some of these "hearing officers" are lawyers and some are not. All of them work for the Department of Licensing. Unless you request otherwise, the hearing will take place by telephone.
At the hearing, the "hearing officer" will offer the arresting officer's police report as evidence against you and will then consider any testimony and/or argument that you wish to make. Defenses exist in DOL administrative suspension hearings that are not obvious to the uninitiated and an experienced DUI defense attorney will carefully explore the facts of your case to reveal all potential defenses.
If the "hearing officer" finds that the evidence establishes that the arresting officer had reasonable grounds to arrest you and that he/she complied with all of the necessary requirements in administering the breath test or that you made a knowing and intelligent decision to refuse the breath test, the suspension or revocation will be upheld. If, however, the "hearing examiner" finds that the evidence does not establish these elements, the suspension or revocation will be dismissed.
If you lose the administrative hearing, you can appeal to the Superior Court of the county in which you were arrested. The appeals process is time consuming and costly. It also may not be meaningful unless you can obtain a stay of the license suspension during the course of the appeal. To obtain a stay, you must convince a judge that you have a liklihood of success on the merits of your appeal and that you would suffer irrevocable harm if the stay is not granted.
Finally, if you lose the administrative hearing, you must obtain SR22 "high risk" insurance prior to reinstatement of your driving privileges and you must maintain that insurance for three years following reinstatement. You may also be required to re-take the written and/or driving exam.
