http://fox5sandiego.com/2015/12/31/woman-claims-her-body-brews-alcohol-has-dui-charge-dismissed/
:o
This thing keeps popping up from time to time. First off, BS. Second, even if its a true story, the prosecution was lame. If you know you have this condition you shouldn’t be driving. If you dont know you have it, how are you going to be able to claim it as a defense? Whoever drives impaired on alcohol or drugs deserves every ounce of punishment they receive.
I don’t know whether the condition is real. If this happens to her on a daily basis where she behaves in an intoxicated manner every night then it’s tough to swallow the contention that she didn’t know before the night she was arrested that she was getting spontaneously intoxicated or at least incapable of safely driving in the evening. Maybe that lacks the intent for DUI but certainly not for reckless driving.
I also don’t know if the condition is real but my guess is that you would have a tolerance if the body did this all the time so maybe she wouldn’t know.
My body produces alcohol all the time. Seems like every on on this forum produces alcohol.
Yeah, for some reason mine produces ~ 200 gallons/yr.
The only defense I know of is duress. Intent isn’t needed when the action is a privilege rather than a right. Drive plus impaired equals guilty.
Most on here suggest not drinking while brewing. I really dont understand the idea of preparing a defence before drinking and driving. Some of us have had friends and family killed by people who think they should be able to drink and drive. Politics and religion gets jumped on here. So should the idea that dui is no big deal.
If the condition is real, it could be possible that she can stink of booze yet be 100% straight due to tolerance.
I would hope they are putting as much effort into to how to kill the yeast causing the issue as they are putting into to defending the DUI. I’m not a doctor, biologist or chemist but one would think you need to identify the strain of yeast and attempt to selectively remove it from her gut to really solve the problem.
It’s not my place to judge if she is impaired while driving at this point so I’m leaving that question alone.
Just hoping she is being treated in addition to being judged.
Paul
Possibly at lower BAC’s, but there’s no way she’s walking around at 0.30 and not impaired. Tolerance generally means you can clear out the ethanol faster from your system, but if her levels are that high she would definitely be feeling it. A hallmark of gut-fermentation syndrome is that those suffering from it feel intoxicated after consuming carbohydrates. One study showed that 1 gram of dextrose led to a BAC of roughly 0.0025 in these patients. If this can be extrapolated linearly (and there’s no data to support that, just a WAG on my part), then it would take over a kilo of carbs to get in the ballpark she was reported at. Something just doesn’t add up for me here. Then again, I’m not an expert and I’m just going by what I’m seeing in the article (reported by a journalist who is likely not an expert, either).
More conclusive evidence would be a positive stool culture for S. cerevesiae, but I didn’t see any mention of that in the article.
Treatment is typically two courses of antifungals, along with probiotics to ensure proper recolonization of the gut. The article does mention that she is being treated. But if this is BS, it would be a good way to explain a negative stool culture at this point if that ever became an issue in her case.
I’m not sure if California follows the majority rule that DUI is a strict liability crime. It may well do so. I disagree that DUI is a strict liability crime because it involves a privilege but because the risk of harm has been deemed to outweigh the risk of punishing an innocent individual.
The defendant probably would not be able to claim duress as an affirmative defense because no other individual exercised a threat against the defendant to make her drive. Automation might be a better fit (her body acted reflexively without conscious control) but probably doesn’t work for the driving because she consciously chose to drive and keep driving after she began showing signs of intoxication.
There is a slim good faith defense accepted in most states to strict liability crimes when the defendant acted within a reason to believe a crime was not occurring. Here the argument might be that the defendant had consumed no alcohol within a time before driving that no reasonable person would assume intoxication before driving and she was not intoxicated at the time she began driving. I think that’s the defense attorney’s argument here. I don’t buy it because she had to know this spontaneous intoxication occurs on a regular basis but there is a legal defense to be had out of it.
I didn’t mean that the woman in the article could claim duress. But if a person can prove they had been forced by another to drive while impaired…
The bigger issue is the idea of using this woman’s story as a defense the next time someone is caught driving while impaired. I’m sure it was meant sarcastically and just to spur some conversation. I just felt compelled to point out that we come down pretty quick on political or religious comments, and probably should be clear that the AHA and this Forum does not condone drinking and driving. That’s all…
From a DUI enforcement cop perspective - I’ve heard this defense before on one of my cases. Upon further research, it’s EXTREMELY rare and has only been legitimately seen, thus far, in a select Asian population that has an extra loop of bowel that allows the carbs and yeast to become stagnant enough to allow fermentation. In those studies the BAC found was still extremely low and not enough to cause intoxication.
At a .300 BAC all but professional alcohols are blackout drunk. Very few make it past .200 and retain the ability to walk.
This case, from what I’ve read, was a gullible prosecutor that didn’t research the condition for herself.
Happy Brewing!
Oh! I know, that’s what I have been telling my brother all the time. I must share this post with him so he understands it better. He does know a very good DUI attorney Los Angeles but really don’t want him to get in trouble ever. However, it is better not to drive drunk.
+1
My body will be producing some in about two weeks! Vanilla Porter, in fact!
I don’t get drunk from it but I’m pretty sure my body ferments sugars because it is continuously producing CO2.
That may not be CO2. ;D Methane comes to mind though. 8)
Paul
Yeah, just a joke to lighten the mood on the thread. It wasn’t intended to be scientifically accurate. I’m always up for some juvenile fart humor.