Opinion ID: 2581912
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Definition of Prior Alcohol Enforcement Contacts

Text: Although the absence of a definition of prior alcohol enforcement contacts was raised by the parties below, and again on appeal, the district court's order does not indicate that it considered the issue. However, given our holding that the district court erred in suppressing the evidence of Rodgers's alcohol test based upon the information regarding eligibility for a conditional driver's permit, we must address the issue. Rodgers argues that this court's holding in Castro v. Administrative Director of the Courts, 97 Hawai`i 463, 40 P.3d 865, reconsideration denied, 97 Hawai`i 463, 40 P.3d 865 (2002), is controlling in the instant case. In Castro, this court concluded that the phrase `prior alcohol enforcement contacts' would incorporate and incorrectly connote, in a layperson's mind, arrests for DUI[,] and that such a misinterpretation was not unreasonable. Castro, 97 Hawai`i at 469, 40 P.3d at 871. We held that, inasmuch as the information conveyed to the arrestee did not inform him which revocation period applied to him, the misleading information legally precluded him from making a knowing and intelligent decision whether to submit to an alcohol concentration test. Castro, 97 Hawai`i at 470, 40 P.3d at 872. In the instant case, however, Rodgers stipulated that this was her first arrest for DUI within the past five years. Thus, even if she reasonably believed that prior alcohol enforcement contacts included DUI arrests, only one period of administrative revocation could have applied to her. Therefore, our holding in Castro is inapposite to the instant case because Rodgers was not misled as to which penalty applied to her. As we have noted supra, the HPD 386B forms do not define the term prior alcohol enforcement contacts. Rodgers also argues that a reasonable person could easily be confused and misled as to whether prior alcohol enforcement contacts includes: (1) a prior arrest or conviction for having an open container of an alcoholic beverage in a motor vehicle; (2) a prior arrest or conviction for being a minor in possession of an alcoholic beverage; (3) a liquor license violation; (4) a drunk and disorderly conviction; or (5) a prior arrest or conviction for selling an alcoholic beverage to a person less than 21 years of age. However, Rodgers does not claim, and the record does not indicate, that she had ever been arrested for or convicted of any of the offenses she lists. Nothing before us explains why or how she could have been misled into attributing the various interpretations she offers to the relevant term, prior alcohol enforcement contacts. Therefore, given: (1) the HPD 386B forms' specific references to Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicating Liquor and Habitually Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicating Liquor or Drugs; and (2) the context of Rodgers's DUI arrest; and (3) the specific absence of any facts explaining why or how Rodgers could have been misled into interpreting prior alcohol enforcement contacts in the manner she suggests, we hold that, under the circumstances of this case, the absence of a definition of prior alcohol enforcement contacts did not affect Rodgers's knowing and intelligent decision to take an alcohol test.