Court Opinion

ID: 9851661
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:17:07.695095+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:11.166103
License: Public Domain

BRYNER, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
*695I dissent.
I believe AS 28.35.083(e) creates an implied privilege as to the results of an independent blood test taken pursuant to that statute.1 The obvious purpose of AS 28.-35.033(e) is to foster compliance with the implied consent law by assuring the availability of a reliable, independent blood test to DWI arrestees who might otherwise be skeptical about the prospect of submitting to the breath test required under the implied consent statutes.2 To read AS 28.35.-033(e) as permitting routine disclosure to the prosecution of blood test results is to defeat the very purpose of the statute, since such a reading conditions the independent test on the arrestee’s willingness to run the risk of providing the prosecution with additional evidence of guilt. I doubt that many arrestees will be willing to take this risk, and, consequently, few will see the opportunity for an independent blood test as a realistic incentive to submit to the required breath test. The inevitable result of the majority’s holding in this case will simply be to increase the number of people who refuse to submit to a breath test.

. Where the accused, having obtained a blood test, elects to use the results in evidence, the privilege arising under AS 28.35.033(e) would, of course, be waived. Similarly, if evidentiary use of blood test results is contemplated by the defense, those results will be subject to discovery under Criminal Rule 16 to the same extent as other test results prepared for trial at the direction of the accused or counsel for the accused.

. This purpose is reflected in Vermont’s independent blood test statute, which is similar to Alaska’s statute but expressly privileges blood test results. See 23 Vt.Stat.Ann. § 1203(a); State v. Normandy, 143 Vt. 383, 465 A.2d 1358 (1983); State v. Raymond, 139 Vt. 464, 431 A.2d 453 (1981).