This person is obviously intoxicated. If she refuses the field sobriety tests, she's sill getting arrested.

What's the point of the dog & pony show? Seems like a waste of department resources.

Legality reasons for court is my guess.

Defense attorneys.

Sorry, I'm not buying that. If that's the case, it implies you can beat a DUI simply by refusing the field tests.

Unless your State has a mandatory blood draw law - you can. You generally surrender your driving license in the process though.

Because of the court system. The more tests/proof the cops can show failed the more likely the charge will stick.

They want you to create more evidence to help them against you in court.  

Thats why you run.

humiliation ritual
not that I have a problem with it really

Try it.

I think you're attempting to make a statement rather than ask a legit question.

Not sure what statement you think I'm trying to make. From my layman's POV, it looks like poor judgement on the Officer's part to go through all that when it's prima facia obvious that the person is drunk. And as previously mentioned, there are states where they will pull blood anyway. Pretty sure most other states will make you blow if you refuse the field tests.

In this state the roadside breathalyzer can't be used in court, but what you blow at the station is. And yes, if you refuse then the SOS suspends your license for a bit.

I think she was too drunk to feel embarrassment.

She should've tried the ol throw the keys in the backseat and chug a flask of liquor trick.

It doesn't guarantee that you'll beat the charge, but I was the alternate on a jury (heard all evidence, not the deliberations) where the defendant, with 3x previous DUIs, beat the charge because he refused and the cop did a poor job of documenting everything.  
There is a reason that every attorney I've heard speak on the subject, advises their client to refuse to blow even if it means automatic license revocation if they have even the slightest doubt about how much alcohol they consumed.

A person has to be dumber than a rock to agree to any roadside test including the breathalyzer when they know they are drunk. I would love to hear how doing any of that has ever benefited a drunk driver.

Documentation

Standardized testing to ensure an unbias evaluation

I bet there's a fair number who under estimate what their bac is.  Not the pros of course.

Procedure

Some states refusing FST when suspected of DUI is automatic suspension of license for 1 year.  You still get arrested and they can request a warrant for a blood draw.  If you’re drunk, being uncooperative isn’t gonna get you off the hook.

Not sure if it's the same everywhere but here if you blew over a certain number it was worse. I think it was .15 .  If you blew under, there was a better chance they would plead it down on your first offense.  That was a while ago though.

The pros can be the worst. I knew a guy that “felt fine” and blew 5x the limit.  

Waste of Department resources? You have no idea- this is the result of decades of defense attorneys and judges who can't read

The chick in OP's video. Send her to me. I can fix her.

It was only beer

Every failed test, every PBT blow on record, every slurred word and stumble is one more thing the defense atty is going to have to explain away, and one more demonstration of the police not arresting someone without PC.

I guess that's what I'm not getting. These people (regardless if they do the FSTs or not) get arrested and then have to submit to a subsequent blood draw or breathalyzer. I would think that by itself, is all the conclusive proof the court would need for a conviction.

Nobody's being convicted of DUI from just failing* a FST, are they?

*I've heard it stated several times there is no pass/fail of a FST further leading to my confusion as to the actual point of this.

Ocifer....take me drunk, I'm home!!

Well. Yeah.

Depends on some other stuff.  But yeah that's the gist of it. Without SFST and/or blood or breath you basically just have actions before the stop and during the stop. Depending on what is said and done it may be hard for the jury to see anything and then it's based solely on the observations without anything scientifically backing it up.

SFST isn't really a pass/fail no. It's an indicator based on other observations. An indicator backed up by science.

THIS is the answer for a lot of dumb shit.

In Maryland if you know your over but not stumbling and falling the best thing you can do is refuse everything. Yes you loose your DL for a year but you can request and get a limited DL so you can still go to work with a blow and go. But you wont get a DUI on your record.

Wisconsin, probably the most sober person besides the cops driving.

It is an electromechanical test, so they can better make an arrest decision, with no concern over improperly administered SFSTs, bad instructions, officer bias, etc etc.  

More data = better.  

Overall decision can be tough when someone looks borderline.  You don’t want a low BAC arrest, also don’t want to allow a drunk to drive off  and kill someone.  So in those situations, something like this would be quite helpful.  

Basically- doing DUI cases all the time gets you good at doing it.  PBT’s are somewhat useful for those cops.  The ones not doing it very often- well it is probably even more helpful for them.

Every now and then someone looks drunk, has slurred speech, and the odor of alcohol.  Then when they are putting the cuffs on they see the diabetic bracelet and call rescue instead.  If you got the beetus control your shit.

Wisconsin 8.5 .

Failing FST’s-  plus driving and other observations.  Clearly don’t need a breath test, because people refuse all the time (and get convicted typically of it goes to trial).

Failing FST’s can also mean anything from a .08 level to holy shit falling down drunk.  Or below .08 if they are a lightweight, have no tolerance, or have other stuff on board.  Somewhat subjective tests that are attempted to be as objective as possible (hence the standardized name).  Someone who shows 6 good clues on HGN, but technically passes the other tests or is marginal, likely is just a practiced drinker and I would usually arrest, but others might miss.  The tests just help you make a decision, paint the whole picture, etc.  

Lots of cops are not very good at FST’s.  They don’t do them often enough.  More than a few times I had someone about to let someone go when I had to step in, because they were missing things, doing tests poorly, or I wasn’t quite convinced.  Someone who is good at it, they can crank out an investigation, arrest, and paperwork pretty well.  Kick ass in court.  But it takes a while to learn, and you have to have a knack for it.  Good DUI cops are really good at making those arrest decisions, because they have picked up the details others miss.  You also realize when someone is just not right medically/mentally, and not actually DUII, when a less experienced person might assume they were impaired (or more impaired than mental).  Plenty of times where someone thought they were seeing something (HGN) but it wasn’t. They just did not do it often enough, and when they found an oddball case were more likely to screw it up.  

Example- guy killed someone in a boating accident, dead guy was drunk, (it was really his fault), etc etc.  Anyhow marine units were certain the boat driver was drunk, because everyone else on the boat was, and that would mean a homicide charge.  I met them at the dock, guy seemed fine.  I ran him thru SFST’s, told them he seemed sober.  They were a bit hard to convince due to preexisting ideas, but knew I was good at it.  Regardless, we talked the guy into doing a breath test to verify, which was 0.00%, as I expected.  Point being, sometimes you need someone who is just more familiar with the process and has tested a lot of people, who can take a clear look at things.  

PBT’s can help be that kind of uninvolved expert opinion, to help you make that kind of a decision.  (We didn’t have them, case law).

The initial stop is made on reasonable suspicion of intoxication. The FST along with the officers personal observations of the driver establishes probable cause for the arrest and become evidence for the trial.

The reason for the initial stop may turn out to be a medical condition or other reason than intoxication.

That's why I was hoping to be clear that I'm not talking borderline cases. Talking people in an accident/damaged vehicle, barely able to stand/speak, etc.

As far as bad instructions, bias...I'm shocked watching some of these where the Officer can't even perform the demonstration and gets called out on it. Which is one of the reasons I'm questioning the Officer's reasoning for doing this in the first place, when they know they are going to arrest them and force blood and/or breath.

Thanks for all the feedback. Guess its just one of those things. "Reasons", aka .gov policy.

And Defense Attorneys.

lol and there’s been plenty of videos where person is having medical emergency & is still arrested for dui and it becomes expensive defending those charges bc we all know that cops are always correct.

Before you deprive a person of their freedoms you have to be able to articulate that you have eliminated every possible doubt that the arrest is just.

I'm okay with the "roadside ballet." It's not really changing her outcome aside from making a conviction a little easier.

Now, ask yourselves why EVERY cop you have EVER heard of being pulled over for DUI always, always, ALWAYS refuses the stupid people tricks

ALWAYS