I was arrested for a dui. I had run my car into my front ditch because of night blindness and had not had anything to drink. My boyfriend went out to try to get it out of the ditch. I went inside with my son and while waiting the 30-45 minutes for him to get it out had drank about 4 or 5 shots of vodka. I had also taken my inhaler for an asthma attack. I smoke quite heavily and being stressed out I was chain smoking. The cop arrested me because I blew positive on a pbt even though it had been 30-45 minutes since I had wrecked into the ditch. He did not see my driving at all. In addition to this I've had gastric bypass and had not eaten all day. Any suggestions for my defense?

Your attorney will likley attack the timing of the test in relation to the tested level. There should be documentation of the time of the accident, assuming someone notified police. The time passage between when you can show that the crash occurred, and the time that the test was taken to produce that result will be critical to a defense that you were drinking AFTER the accident. This won't be a do it yourself defense - you really need the services of an experienced criminal defense attorney here. (Juries tend to get really suspicious and critical when people testify that they drink and chain smoke to combat an asthma attack, so spilling that information without a superior legal strategy can damage your case much more than it can help it).

__________________
While pointers can be helpful, ultimately the number one lesson in any legal action is: don't take legal advice from books, family, friends, co-workers, police officers, grocery clerks, web sites, or people on legal message boards. The only person who can give YOU legal advice is YOUR attorney.

http://www.aardvarc.org

The test can be given up to 3 hours after an accident. The issue is going to be whether you were drinking after the accident. Hopefully someone can testify to that. I do agree that you need an attorney on this. Have you browsed through the information in LawInfo's Free Legal Resource Center to learn more about your issue yet? See: http://www.lawinfo.com/consumer.html and http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/index.html. You can certainly try to speak to a lawyer to determine what legal options may be available. In the meantime, you may be able to learn more on your own. Search the "Free Legal Resources" tab, or browse the Consumer Resources. Good luck.