Florida voters are on the verge of determining whether marijuana should be legal in this state for medicinal purposes, as so far 21 other states and D.C. have done.
It’s important to note that such a measure wouldn’t make driving while intoxicated legally acceptable under any circumstances. This is why our Fort Lauderdale DUI defense attorneys are unclear about why state legislators felt it necessary to introduce Florida Senate Bill 1118.
If passed, this measure would result in substantial changes to the state’s current DUI statutes, under FL Statute 316.193. The rewrites are extensive (and can be read here), but the crux of the issue is this: Police and prosecutors would no longer need to prove that a driver who consumed any federally-controlled substance was actually impaired by that substance. Rather, the measure would establish an arbitrary “metabolite DUI” provision. In these cases, prosecutors would only need to show that the drug was present in the driver’s system prior to getting behind the wheel.
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