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tremm
tremm Reader
4/3/23 2:27 a.m.

Does anyone know about how cannabis is handled?

I think blood testing is done. I'm mostly curious about how accurate it is. I assume breathalyzers are pretty accurate; but I don't know the biology of blood testing.

I'd be interested in knowing how commonly people get tested/charged for it. And whether it's on-site at the side of the road, or at the station. And general stats/costs etc. I guess CBD is ok to drive with, since the blood test is for THC. (depending on state)

I assume if your car smells, or your eyes are red/glazed, you're likely to get tested? Probably a pupil test/sobriety test too.

I guess any other drugs, while we're talking about it. I assume you can be charged with a .. DUI (DWI is alcohol right?) for something like sleeping drugs, pain medication(?), adhd, mental illnesses, etc.

ddavidv
ddavidv UltimaDork
4/3/23 7:04 a.m.

Impaired driving is the one and only reason I'm not a fan of legalized cannibis.  But, that's a different topic.

It goes without saying that, as an insurance adjuster, I see the end results of impaired driving regularly. Hit something at 2am and "not sure what happened"? Yeah, I know what happened.

No special favors from me. "Please don't total my car. I can't afford another one." Oh, is that right? Too bad I found all sorts of damage on your car that may or may not actually be related. Off to Copart it goes. 

I have no patience for these people. None. Zero. This is not something new. Everyone past the age of 12 knows you don't drink and drive. 

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish)
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) PowerDork
4/3/23 7:43 a.m.
Kreb (Forum Supporter) said:

I've probably driven while drunk something like 30 times in my life. Every time I've been terrified, windows down, white-knuckled, repeatedly saying to myself "please don't let me hurt anyone". Fortunately I've had no incidents.

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up.  Your luck will run out.  I certainly hope you don't hurt or kill somebody.

This is the mentality that causes countless deaths every year.  Without a doubt it meets the level of manslaughter if not 3rd degree murder.

Racebrick
Racebrick Reader
4/3/23 7:49 a.m.

Cannabis does not impair motor function like alcohol, but it is always mentioned along side it.  For those if you that think cannabis should not be legal, do you feel the same way about all drugs?  It seems like an arbitrary distinction to me.  Millions of pill poppers seems like a bigger problem.

Beer Baron
Beer Baron MegaDork
4/3/23 8:21 a.m.
tremm said:

Does anyone know about how cannabis is handled?

I'd be interested in knowing how commonly people get tested/charged for it. And whether it's on-site at the side of the road, or at the station. And general stats/costs etc. I guess CBD is ok to drive with, since the blood test is for THC. (depending on state)

I assume if your car smells, or your eyes are red/glazed, you're likely to get tested? Probably a pupil test/sobriety test too.

The earlier video link about the guy arrested for DUI after blowing .000 sent me down a bit of a YouTube rabbit hole. In that example, it was pretty clearly a police officer getting into a dick measuring contest and making up excuses to arrest the kid who did not 'Respect his Authoritahy!'

It's clear the kid hasn't been drinking, so the officer pivots to marijuana. Which provided opportunity for seeing that side of things.

The problem with marijuana is that THC remains in your system well after psychoactive effects wear off. It's pretty easy to drug test at work and find out if someone has had pot in the past month. It's not easy to objectively tell if it's actively in their system and impairing them. It's not like a BAC test that is relatively clean, objective, and directly correlates with impairment.

So it seems that the primary way to test for it is that very specific and controlled tests have to be administered by specially trained and certified Drug Recognition Experts - DRE's. Most patrol officers are *not* DRE's. They could administer some of the same tests in the same way they might administer a field sobriety test, but they're not certified to give testimony about drug impairment.

As for the impairment caused by Marijuana, it doesn't impair motor control like alcohol does. But it does impair attention much like a cell phone or texting. Marijuana tends to cause people to hyper-focus on a single stimulus. Which is fun if you want to listen to music or eat corn chips. Driving requires taking in a LOT of stimuli and processing them all quickly. Under the influence of marijuana, it's much easier to get distracted by something going on inside the car or on the side of the road and be completely unaware of what's in the road in front of you.

As for legalizing marijuana or not... that's a separate issue. I quickly googled the topic, and found lots of conflicting information with individual studies showing increased accidents, no statistically significant change in car crashes, and slight decrease in auto accidents.

This AAA study seems to be the one most widely referenced. It makes mention that in the state of Washington more drivers involved in fatal crashes tested positive for THC in the 5 years after legalization than the 5 years before. I am not seeing mention that the rate of fatal accidents increased, just that more people driving tested positive for THC. But these results would also be consistent with taking marijuana on weekends and getting into a fatal car crash on Monday because you're texting while driving. They state, "The study did not attempt to determine if marijuana contributed to the crashes included in its latest research. It focused only on the prevalence of drivers who tested positive for active THC."

Evidence that points to some increase in accidents immediately after legalization of marijuana still finds that alcohol, cell phones, and distracted driving remained much greater causes of fatal accidents.

I am personally in favor of legalized recreational marijuana, so I am biased.

ProDarwin
ProDarwin MegaDork
4/3/23 8:36 a.m.
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up. 

Not pointing a finger at Kreb here, but have you ever met an alcoholic?

A lot of this thread is why I support some sort of interlock/intervention/detection system as the NTSB recommended.  I recognize I am in the minority here big time.  But sadly punishing people after the incident has proven to be ineffective and destroys countless lives :(

Steve_Jones
Steve_Jones SuperDork
4/3/23 8:43 a.m.

In reply to Beer Baron :

My issue with the AAA study is people like to manipulate the data to prove the point (as we all know). More people tested + in the 5 years after it was legal? So? How many were you testing before it was legal and why were you testing them? It made sense to after it was legal, because you needed data. If 10% of the people involved in accidents were tested before, but 100% were tested after, surprise! More people tested positive after.....

Beer Baron
Beer Baron MegaDork
4/3/23 8:47 a.m.

In reply to Steve_Jones :

I think the article points out the biggest flaws in the study. Twice as many people positive for THC just means twice as many people are partaking in marijuana. It doesn't mean twice as many are driving under the influence.

Jerry
Jerry PowerDork
4/3/23 8:56 a.m.

The guy that destroyed my concrete mailbox and his Civic had beers in the back seat, they didn't do a breathalyzer.  A friend did a background check and found multiple speeding tickets, DUIs and a suspended license in 2008.  Luckily it was only my mailbox, not someone walking their dog or kid in a stroller (we don't have sidewalks).

My mom's best friend was killed by a drunk driver years ago.  I have zero sympathy for DUIs.

OHSCrifle
OHSCrifle GRM+ Memberand UberDork
4/3/23 8:57 a.m.
ProDarwin said:
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up. 

Not pointing a finger at Kreb here, but have you ever met an alcoholic?

A lot of this thread is why I support some sort of interlock/intervention/detection system as the NTSB recommended.  I recognize I am in the minority here big time.  But sadly punishing people after the incident has proven to be ineffective and destroys countless lives :(

I know several.... and I agree totally.

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish)
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) PowerDork
4/3/23 9:37 a.m.
ProDarwin said:
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up. 

Not pointing a finger at Kreb here, but have you ever met an alcoholic?

A lot of this thread is why I support some sort of interlock/intervention/detection system as the NTSB recommended.  I recognize I am in the minority here big time.  But sadly punishing people after the incident has proven to be ineffective and destroys countless lives :(

Very well said, and I agree with you.

slefain
slefain UltimaDork
4/3/23 9:58 a.m.
OHSCrifle said:
slefain said:

As the survivor of not one but two head-on on collisions caused by drunk drivers, one of which is why I have an erector set for a right leg and spent a year re-learning to walk, berkeley your work acquaintance. His life may be ruined, but he still has a life to live. And berkeley anyone else who drives drunk.

Damn. Twice!? And I agree with you. 

Yup, twice. Second one was on our family vacation at Disney.

Here's what Florida man on a crotch rocket with a liquid lunch does to the front of a SUV at roughly 120 (I was nearly stopped when he hit):

BAC was 0.252. I know because I read the coroner report. He was full tucked, throttle pinned, and didn't turn. All the damage from the headlight up is the biker's body, his bike bounced off and burst into flames like a movie. He landed beside my driver's door (that's his shoes, not mine) after doing two complete ragdoll spins straight up. If my wife had been the lead car in the ES300 instead of her following me, she'd probably be dead. They scraped the guy off the asphalt and flew him to the ER, but he was gone before he hit the pavement.

Kreb (Forum Supporter)
Kreb (Forum Supporter) GRM+ Memberand PowerDork
4/3/23 10:32 a.m.
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:
Kreb (Forum Supporter) said:

I've probably driven while drunk something like 30 times in my life. Every time I've been terrified, windows down, white-knuckled, repeatedly saying to myself "please don't let me hurt anyone". Fortunately I've had no incidents.

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up.  Your luck will run out.  I certainly hope you don't hurt or kill somebody.

This is the mentality that causes countless deaths every year.  Without a doubt it meets the level of manslaughter if not 3rd degree murder.

I thought that my post might elicit a response like this, and I totally get where you are coming from. I make no excuse for my actions. What I didn't say is that I've only driven while drunk once in the last 30 years.  Most of the times were when I was on a church league softball team in my 20s and we'd celebrate our victories with a trip to the bar.

The second part of my post was to emphasize that drunk driving is just one manifestation of driving in a manner in which one should not. Alcohol abuse is common and its measurable. But there is no excuse for placing others in harms way, regardless of the means.

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter)
AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
4/3/23 10:33 a.m.

In reply to slefain :

berkeley. beyond the physical injuries, that's some E36 M3 that you can't un-see.  i know it's been a while; i hope you and the fam are OK.

RevRico
RevRico GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
4/3/23 11:03 a.m.
Racebrick said:

Cannabis does not impair motor function like alcohol, but it is always mentioned along side it.  For those if you that think cannabis should not be legal, do you feel the same way about all drugs?  It seems like an arbitrary distinction to me.  Millions of pill poppers seems like a bigger problem.

Yea, these types of discussions always seem to ignore the millions of people on anti depressants, pain killers, and stimulants that are often doctor prescribed driving around every day. They also use this weird assumption that nobody got high and drove around before pot was legalized in their area. Or that nobody smoked pot before it was legal. 

The big issue with weed is that there isn't a breathalyzer equivalent for it yet. Great for getting DUI numbers up, bad for people that just want to smoke to relax on the weekends or after work instead of drink. And a lot of people still cling to Reefer Madness like it's a Holy text and not a piece of propaganda. 

Let's not even mention the complete wastes of oxygen that are shooting up at red lights or in gas station parking lots. I'd rather share the road with a thousand drunks than one person in a heroin nod. 

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter)
AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
4/3/23 11:08 a.m.

there's no way this thread doesn't get locked

slefain
slefain UltimaDork
4/3/23 11:12 a.m.

In reply to AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) :

Thanks. Therapy for the PTSD helped, as did support from FastAsleep. The kids did okay because we still managed to pull off the Disney trip. I spent the week on the phone with lawyers, police, and insurance people while hiding reality from the kids. My two sons were in the SUV with me and saw it all happen, so there were some nightmares about fire after that. I still jump at the sound of a wound out street bike on the road with me. Floridaman's problems were over the minute he took flight, I was left to clean up his mess. And thanks to Florida's berkeleyed up insurance laws the whole settlement process was a joke that screws the victim.

SV reX
SV reX MegaDork
4/3/23 11:20 a.m.
Racebrick said:

Cannabis does not impair motor function like alcohol, but it is always mentioned along side it.  For those if you that think cannabis should not be legal, do you feel the same way about all drugs?  It seems like an arbitrary distinction to me.  Millions of pill poppers seems like a bigger problem.

Seriously?

Who cares about motor function when it's obvious the driver is mentally impaired?  Sure, my muscles can technically operate the steering wheel, but I really don't give a berkeley- I'd much rather watch the little green light blinking on the stereo.

YES. I absolutely think there should be stricter responses to ANYONE who drives impaired, regardless of whether it is legal or not.  That's why those pills have labels that tell users to avoid driving or operating machinery... because your abilities ARE impaired. 
 

For the record, I am also in support of legalized recreational cannabis. But driving under the influence is an ABSOLUTE NO.  No excuse. Go to jail. 

SV reX
SV reX MegaDork
4/3/23 11:21 a.m.
AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) said:

there's no way this thread doesn't get locked

You're right. 

jharry3
jharry3 GRM+ Memberand Dork
4/3/23 11:54 a.m.

That happened to a guy I knew growing up.   

He was on his Harley at 2:am  going maybe 40mph and some drunk guy in a van turned left right in front of  him.   Dead on the scene. 

pheller
pheller UltimaDork
4/3/23 11:57 a.m.

In reply to SV reX :

On impairement, I totally agree. 

It's wild that someone can be loopy out of their mind on a prescription drug, do something stupid at work, but manage to keep their job by saying the forgot to notify their boss or something. While someone with a clear head who smoked a joint weeks ago while on vacation will lose their job. 

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish)
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) PowerDork
4/3/23 12:20 p.m.
Kreb (Forum Supporter) said:
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:
Kreb (Forum Supporter) said:

I've probably driven while drunk something like 30 times in my life. Every time I've been terrified, windows down, white-knuckled, repeatedly saying to myself "please don't let me hurt anyone". Fortunately I've had no incidents.

You say that every time you do it you are terrified, yet you do it over and over and over??  Something doesn't add up.  Your luck will run out.  I certainly hope you don't hurt or kill somebody.

This is the mentality that causes countless deaths every year.  Without a doubt it meets the level of manslaughter if not 3rd degree murder.

I thought that my post might elicit a response like this, and I totally get where you are coming from. I make no excuse for my actions. What I didn't say is that I've only driven while drunk once in the last 30 years.  Most of the times were when I was on a church league softball team in my 20s and we'd celebrate our victories with a trip to the bar.

The second part of my post was to emphasize that drunk driving is just one manifestation of driving in a manner in which one should not. Alcohol abuse is common and its measurable. But there is no excuse for placing others in harms way, regardless of the means.

Thank you for the clarification and I give you a standing ovation for changing your actions with respect to that.  I did have to chuckle a bit when I read that your driving drunk was after a church type function.  wink  You're now in such a wonderful position to help others and tell them that you "got lucky" but they may not be so lucky if they take that chance.

As far as distracted driving, I've been in car insurance claims for over 26 years.  Distracted driving has always been a "thing".  However with the explosion of cell phone technology (among other things), the rate of distracted driving incidents has skyrocketed recently.  You're spot on in that there are so many manifestations of driving in a way that someone shouldn't.  The million dollar question is how do you stop it?  I get asked that question repeatedly by my CEO and I wish I had a solid answer to give him.  

spitfirebill
spitfirebill MegaDork
4/3/23 12:29 p.m.

It may change from state to state, but you can get a DUI on prescription meds.  Look at the warnings on most meds.    

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter)
Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
4/3/23 12:39 p.m.
spitfirebill said:

It may change from state to state, but you can get a DUI on prescription meds.  Look at the warnings on most meds.    

It's true in my state.  If you do dumb things while driving on cough syrup, you can be issued a DUI.  It's not common because they have to meet the burden of proof, which means they would have to do a blood test for benadryl.  They are totally ready with an infrastructure to test alcohol and weed, but I'm sure it's not common to test for NyQuil, so probably unlikely you'd get charged.

I remember in college getting dinged for underaged possession of alcohol.  My fine was $1 because their burden of proof was to test the contents of the cup... which costs more than the fine.

Beer Baron
Beer Baron MegaDork
4/3/23 12:42 p.m.
spitfirebill said:

It may change from state to state, but you can get a DUI on prescription meds.  Look at the warnings on most meds.    

This is why it's "Driving Under the Influence" not "Driving While Intoxicated". There are a LOT of things you can be under the influence of.

Looking at the tests that a Drug Recognition Expert will perform, they seem to be about looking for signs of neurological and motor impairment, not trying to prove the presence of any particular substance. Prescription drugs could absolutely impair your ability to pass those tests.

The police are out to make convictions. Proving that you were "impaired" is a lot easier than proving exactly how much of what substance was in your system.

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