Court Opinion

ID: 9508476
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 21:32:37.088272+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:07:33.244709
License: Public Domain

MR. JUSTICE SHEEHY,
specially concurring:
I concur in the result of this appeal but not in the discussion of the nystagmus test.
A positive horizontal gaze nystagmus result should be approved by us as supplying probable cause for an arrest but not as positive proof of DUI, since so many factors can cause nystagmus. Here we have a driver who was on daily use of Valium by prescription. No distinction is made in the opinion that such drugs may themselves cause horizontal gaze nystagmus. An unsophisticated jury would take the result of the test in this case, without further explanation, as absolute scientific proof of DUI. The subject is much broader than that. A requirement for admissibility should be that the additional “battery” of field tests were also given, or that a blood alcohol test confirmed the nystagmus results. That is what other states require. Arizona v. Superior Court and Blake (1986), 149 Ariz. 269, 718 P.2d 171.