Opinion ID: 2032679
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Technical Writings

Text: The State contends that, even if we decline to take judicial notice of the general acceptance of the HGN test as a reliable indicator of alcohol impairment based on the reasoning of prior judicial decisions, we should do so based on the technical writings on the subject. The State makes this argument in light of our ruling on the standard of review of Frye cases in In re Commitment of Simons, wherein we held that, in reviewing a trial court's Frye analysis, we may consider not only the record, but also sources outside the record, including legal and scientific articles, as well as court opinions from other jurisdictions. In re Commitment of Simons, 213 Ill.2d at 531, 290 Ill.Dec. 610, 821 N.E.2d 1184. The State supports its argument with a battery of materials endorsing the use of HGN testing as a reliable indicator of alcohol impairment, including a 1993 resolution of the American Optometric Association that declared the HGN test to be a scientifically valid and reliable tool for trained police officers to use in field sobriety testing. A sampling of the other articles presented by the State includes G. Good & A. Augsberger, Use of Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus As a Part of Roadside Sobriety Testing, 63 Am. J. of Optometry & Physiological Optics 467 (1986); E. Halperin & R. Yolton, Is the Driver Drunk? Oculomotor Sobriety Testing, 57 J. Am. Optometric Ass'n 654 (September 1986); Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus: The Science and the Law, American Prosecutors Research Institute, National Traffic Law Center (1999). Many of the articles offered by the State merely acknowledge the accepted theory that there is a causal connection between HGN and alcohol consumption, which defendant concedes. Several articles do conclude that HGN test results are reliable indicators of alcohol impairment, but at least one of the sources the State provides in the appendix to its brief actually denounces the use of HGN testing for roadside sobriety tests: Unfortunately, that alcohol can produce horizontal gaze-evoked nystagmus has led to a `roadside sobriety' test conducted by law-enforcement officers. Nystagmus as an indicator of alcohol intoxication is fraught with extraordinary pitfalls: many normal individuals have physiologic end-point nystagmus; small doses of tranquilizers that wouldn't interfere with driving ability can also produce nystagmus; nystagmus may be congenital or consequent to structural neurologic disease, and often a neuro-ophthalmologist or sophisticated oculographer is required to determine whether nystagmus is pathologic. Such judgments are difficult for experts to make under the best conditions and impossible to make accurately under roadside conditions. It is unreasonable to have cursorily trained law officers using the test, no matter how intelligent, perceptive, and well meaning they might be. L. Dell'Osso & R. Daroff, Nystagmus and Saccadic Intrusions and Oscillations, at 26-27, in 2 Duane's Clinical Opthamology, ch. 11 (2005). In support of her argument, defendant presents an extensive list of articles that condemn the reliability of HGN testing. The gist of most of these writings is that the HGN test is too delicate a test to be administered and interpreted accurately by police officers outside of a laboratory, and that positive test results can be caused by many other factors besides alcohol. See, e.g., W. Pangman, Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus: Voodoo Science, 2 DWI J. 1 (1987); N. Willey, Feature: Should HGN in OUI be DOA?, 13 Me. B.J. 60 (1998); J. Booker, End-position Nystagmus as an Indicator of Ethanol Intoxication, 41 Science & Justice 113 (2001); J. Mancke, DUI Field Sobriety Tests: Have the Courts Missed a Step?, 73 Pa. B. Ass'n Q. 117 (2002); S. Rubenzer, The Psychometrics and Science of the Standardized Field Sobriety Tests, 27 The Champion 40 (June 2003); J. Booker, The Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus Test: Fraudulent Science in the American Courts, 44 Science & Justice 133 (2004); M. Coffey, DWI  Modern Day Salem Witch Hunts, The Champion, 51 (November 2004). Defendant also argues that the HGN test was not developed to measure whether a subject was impaired, and that it is being improperly used for that purpose today. Defendant maintains that, during an evidentiary hearing in New Mexico, Dr. Burns, who has testified at almost every Frye hearing on HGN testing around the nation, has referred to the incorrect assumption that field sobriety tests are designed to measure driving impairment, and that, when developing the HGN test, the NHTSA pursued the development of tests that would provide statistically valid and reliable indications of a driver's BAC, rather than indications of driving impairment. (Emphasis omitted.) State v. Lasworth, 131 N.M. 739, 742-43, 42 P.3d 844, 847 (2001). Defendant also contends that Dr. Burns has written that [t]he only appropriate criterion measure to assess the accuracy of the SFSTs (standard field-sobriety tests) is BAC. Measures of impairment are irrelevant because performance of the SFSTs must be correlated with BAC level, rather than driving performance. Lasworth, 131 N.M. at 742, 42 P.3d at 847, quoting J. Stuster & M. Burns, Validation of the Standardized Field Sobriety Test Battery of BAC's below 0.10 Percent, Final Report, Submitted to the U.S. Dept. of Transportation, NHTSA, at 10 (1998). The fact that the HGN test was developed to measure blood-alcohol content, but is not used for that purpose but, rather, used as an indicator of impairment, has led one commentator to note, This leads to an apparent contradiction, in that the courts will not accept the SFSTs for the purpose for which they were developed and the method by which they were validated, but will accept them for purposes for which they have not been directly studied or validated. H. Cohen, 10 Defense of Drunk Driving Cases: Criminal, Civil § 10.09, at 6 (2006). Defendant argues that such a contradiction calls into serious question the conclusions reached in Blake, and relied upon by Buening and Wiebler. As illustrated by these conflicting materials, HGN testing appears to have as many critics as it does champions. The technical writings above reveal a dichotomy in the scientific community, rather than the unequivocal or undisputed viewpoint necessary for us to take judicial notice. As such, we cannot take judicial notice of the general acceptance of the HGN test as a reliable indicator of alcohol impairment based on these technical writings. Our holding today does not purport to decide whether the HGN test has been generally accepted as a reliable indicator of alcohol impairment. Rather, we find that this issue cannot be resolved in Illinois on judicial notice alone. In light of the disparate resolutions of the issue in foreign jurisdictions, the varying opinions expressed in articles on the subject, the fact that a Frye hearing has never been held on the matter in Illinois, and the fact that, as far as we are aware, the last Frye hearing held on this controversial methodology was held in Washington in 2000, we hold that a Frye hearing must be held to determine if the HGN test has been generally accepted as a reliable indicator of alcohol impairment.