Cold May Void Drunk Driving Roundup

The Los Angeles city attorney’s office is reviewing cases against as many as 276 drunk-driving suspects arrested this month by police using a much-heralded mobile jail because breath-analyzing devices might have been adversely affected by being used outside in cold weather.

“A problem with respect to some of the evidence was made known to us,” said Marty Vranicar, a supervising deputy city attorney in Van Nuys. “We’re following up on our ethical obligation to review any cases in which there might be problems.”

Officials said they believe the breath machines might have been measuring blood alcohol content too low and expressed concern that defense attorneys could make use of the mechanical problems.

“We’re looking at all the tests that were run to see that we can support those tests,” said Richard Bingle, chief forensic chemist for the Los Angeles Police Department.

He said officers discovered the problem last weekend in Pacoima, where police had deployed the immediate booking and release system, known as IBARS.

The booking unit consists of two converted Rapid Transit District buses, one serving as a jail and the other a command post equipped with three breath-analyzing devices located on the outside of the vehicle. Drunk-driving suspects normally are taken to a police station where breath testing is done indoors.

The mobile unit is intended to process large numbers of drunk-driving suspects by reducing the time officers spend processing a single arrest from the usual two hours to about 30 minutes.

Last weekend, officers noticed condensed vapor forming on the inside of the machine’s breath tubes because of the cold weather, Bingle said. The vapor indicated that the breath samples were becoming diluted before the machines could measure it, he said.

Drunk-driving charges against about 60 suspects arrested Thursday and Friday and booked at the IBARS unit in Pacoima have not been filed yet, Vranicar said. Authorities are reviewing those cases, but also will examine “additional ones that had already been filed,” he said.

In six nights of operation this month in Pacoima, police processed 276 drunk-driving suspects with the IBARS unit, said Sgt. Michael Pattee, officer in charge of the unit. The arrests were the first in a two-year, $4.7-million program that will deploy the mobile 1651470187parts of the city where drunk driving is worst, Pattee said.

“It’s a new program and there are bugs to be worked out,” he said.

“We’re having more problems with the program than we’d like to,” Bingle added, “but that doesn’t mean we’re producing bad results.”

On Feb. 19, police displayed the mobile system to reporters and visitors from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, California Office of Traffic Safety, Maryland State Police, Tucson Police Department and Department of Water and Power.

Police used IBARS to process 35 drunk-driving arrests that night but had to shut down two hours early because high winds were making outdoor paperwork impossible, Sgt. Dennis Zine said.

IBARS was to have been deployed this weekend in Pacoima, but the operation was canceled to allow technicians and chemists to adjust the breath-testing devices and install protection from the wind and cold. When IBARS returns next weekend, it will be in another part of the city, Zine said.