In DUI trials in Tampa, FL, the State Attorney's Office will offer expert testimony from the arresting officer who administered the field sobriety exercises or the technician who administered the breath test. DUI defense attorneys are also able to use expert testimony to present their side of the case to the jury.
Expert testimony can be particular important in Florida DUI cases since the jurors are dealing with complex medical and scientific issues that are outside of their common experience, such as field sobriety exercises, drug recognition, breath test machines, or blood test results.
As the Sammis Law Firm our DUI Lawyers in Tampa, Florida take a scholarly approach to DUI defense by relying on expert witnesses in certain cases to testify at trial or pre-trial motions on a variety of issues. Just listing the expert witness even if the case does not ultimately go to trial can be helpful because the expert can often assist the attorney in spotting innovative issues and presenting that information to the prosecutor.
We have seen many difficult DUI cases in which the prosecutor agreed to reduce the charges only after the expert witness was listed in the case. For many of our clients, utilizing expert witness testimony in DUI cases is a very cost effective way of gaining an edge in pre-trial negotiations or preparing the case for trial. Listed below are individuals recognized as expert witnesses or consultants in DUI cases in Florida.
Source Code Litigation
Many attorneys throughout Florida are filing motions to force the State to either hand over the source code of the Intoxilyzer 8000 or go to trial without the breath test results. These motions have been successful in Seminole County, Orange County, and Sarasota County. Many criminal defense attorneys believe it is just a matter of time until the judges in Hillsborough County also take the position that prosecutors in that county must turn over the source code or go to trial without the breath test results. At the Sammis Law Firm, our attorneys are currently in the process of litigating similar motions.
The source code was developed by the manufacturer or the breath test machines used in Florida, C.M.I. The company has stated that the source code consist of approximately 50,000 lines of computer code written an assembly language.
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