How to get help for DWI


How to Fool a Breathalyzer

Want to trick a breath machine into a low
test result? Or make sure that you're notDr. Michael Hlastala, Professor of
causing a false high reading? Not thatPhysiology, Biophysics and Medicine at the
difficult, says a law firm of San Diego DUIUniversity of Washington has gone farther and
attorneys and lawyers: just control yourconcluded:
breathing.
"By far, the most overlooked error in breath
The simple fact is that these breath machinestesting for alcohol is the pattern of
which determine guilt or innocence in DUIbreathing... The concentration of alcohol
cases are not exactly the reliable deviceschanges considerably during the breath... The
that law enforcement would have us believe.first part of the breath, after discarding
There are dozens of factors that can causethe dead space, has an alcohol concentration
false test results. An example of thatmuch lower than the equivalent BAC
unreliability is the fact that the results(blood-alcohol concentration). Whereas, the
will vary depending upon the breathinglast part of the breath has an alcohol
pattern of the person being tested. This hasconcentration that is much higher than the
been confirmed in a number of scientificequivalent BAC. The last part of the breath
studies.can be over 50% above the alcohol level...
Thus, a breath tester reading of 0.14% taken
In one, for example, a group of men drankfrom the last part of the breath may indicate
moderate doses of alcohol and theirthat the blood level is only 0.09%." 9(6) The
blood-alcohol levels were then measured byChampion  16  (1985).
gas chromatographic analysis of their breath.
The breathing techniques were then varied.Many police officers know this. They also
The results indicated that holding yourknow that if the machine contradicts their
breath for 30 seconds before exhalingjudgement that the person they arrested is
increased the blood-alcohol level by 15.7%.intoxicated, they won't look good. So when
Hyperventilating for 20 seconds immediatelythey tell the arrestee to blow into the
before the analyses of breath, on the othermachine's mouthpiece, they'll yell at him,
hand, decreased the level by 10.6%. Keeping"Keep breathing! Breathe harder! Harder!" As
the mouth closed for five minutes and usingProfessor Hlastala has found, this ensures
shallow nasal breathing resulted inthat the breath captured by the machine will
increasing the blood-alcohol level by 7.3%,be from the bottom of the lungs, near the
and testing after a slow, 20-secondalveolar sacs, which will be richest in
exhalation increased levels by 2%. ("Howalcohol. With the higher alcohol
Breathing Techniques Can Influence theconcentration, the machine will give a higher
Results of Breath-Alcohol Analyses", 22(4)-- but inaccurate -- reading.
Medical  Science  and  the  Law  275.)



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