Data Analysis
Data from misdemeanor DUI cases were entered into MADD’s Court Monitoring database, which is utilized by Court Monitoring programs in nearly 15 MADD state offices. Variables of interest for this report included case disposition to include guilty, not guilty, amended (pled down) and dropped/dismissed, case age, sanctions and prosecutor type. In order to simplify the data yet remain accurate, we determined the various outcomes of cases could be reduced to three categories. “Guilty” includes those cases where the accused pled guilty to DUI or Driving with an Unlawful Alcohol Concentration (DUAC) or they were found guilty in a bench or jury trial. This category also includes plea deals where the offender pled down to a lower BAC (blood alcohol content) than they were originally charged with. We explain DUAC and our decision to count that as a guilty outcome below. “Dropped/Dismissed/Not Guilty” refers to cases that are either clearly marked as one of those three outcomes OR when we can no longer find the case in the public index. “Not Guilty” was added to this “catch all” category because once a person is found not guilty, their case information is erased immediately from the public index causing us to lose the trail of the case. It is not ideal to have a category that includes such a variety of outcomes, but they all essentially share the same situation of our not being able to determine what happened to the case. “Pled Down to a Lesser Charge” means that the accused was not found guilty of DUI or DUAC but was ultimately found guilty to a lesser charge, predominantly reckless driving, stemming from the same incident. As a technical point, whereas this would be referred to as amending the original charge in other states, it is common practice in South Carolina for the original DUI charge to be dismissed (or nol prossed) with a new charge then written for the lesser offense. DUAC is a separate statute (56-5- 2933) from the state’s DUI law (56 -5-2930) but carries essentially equivalent penalties. If a subsequent DUI charge is made after a previous DUAC conviction, that DUI is a second offense. In our discussion with our experts in the system, it was unanimous that a DUAC conviction should be counted the same as a DUI conviction for the purposes of our data analysis. They explained that some people will accept a plea deal to a guilty for DUAC charge because 1) the offender can say they have never had a DUI (technically) if asked and 2) the offender can get the original DUI charge expunged so it will only show up on a driving history but not a criminal history. Given the challenges of getting a DUI conviction in South Carolina, MADD SC sees that getting an agreement to plea to DUAC makes sense given the penalties are essentially equivalent. An additional challenge to analyzing the data is due to the difficult nature of navigating the online public index records. When a case is pled down in South Carolina, as a large percentage are, the original ticket number ceases being used and a new one is opened. However, the old ticket number doesn’t reference what the new ticket number is, so we must undergo a search for the offender in the records. For an unusual name, that may be easy, but for a “Mark Smith,” for example, that could mean a long review of lots of
11
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online