BY BEN L. KAUFMAN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
A federal appeals court said Friday that it is not double jeopardy for an Ohio driver to be convicted of driving under the influence after the arresting officer suspends his license.
The challenge followed convictions in Franklin, Delaware and Licking counties.
Unhappy drivers said that the roadside suspension of their licenses was punishment, and subsequent convictions violated the Fifth Amendment ban on successive punishments for the same crime.
When Ohio appellate courts rejected the drivers' double-jeopardy arguments, they asked U.S. District Judge Edmund A. Sargus Jr. to intervene.
He refused and they appealed.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit in Cincinnati said the question was whether the roadside license suspension - an administrative sanction - was a punishment.
The answer was no, and the appeal failed.
"We cannot regard the suspension of driving privileges as a punishment," the court said.
While Ohio law "may intertwine license suspension with the arrest for drunken driving, this is not sufficient to render the suspension criminally punitive in the Double Jeopardy context. "To hold otherwise would undermine the state's ability to effectively regulate its highways" and "the sanction does not appear excessive in relation to this goal."
Finally, administrative license suspensions "were remedial, not punitive."
Roadside suspensions and DUI convictions stand, the 6th Circuit said.
