Incarceration

At the police station they pulled the car through a garage door - interlock system. Everything gets locked up behind you before they open another door, and there were several very heavy doors with large locks on each before we got to the in-processing station. Once there I sat on a metal bench, still handcuffed, while they entered my life into computers to make sure my life would be miserable for years to come. I was quiet and compliant to all of their questions. At one point I asked if the cuffs are just standard protocol as I was obviously not a threat, they said yes, as I figured. I could imagine if someone was much more drunk than me, or on something else, they could really freak out at this point. They did 2 more breathalyser tests on a much larger machine, both times I blew a consistent .10. The machine printed out a ticket with all my info, calibration records, times, BAC and the officer signed it as this was Evidence Ticket used to incarcerate me and finalize the misdemeanor charge of OWI.

The finger printing process is all digital, basically using a black and white fax scanner. It took a lot of scans, each finger, whole hand and even the pinky side of my hand at which I joked "is this one in case I karate chop something?", they laughed. They used a chart to calculate how long it would take for my BAC to be at a safe limit to be released on my own, which was about 2 and 1/2 hours. They then bagged up everything I had except for pants, shirt and socks and since I didn't have the $100 bond on me they gave me my cell phone so I could arrange for someone to pick me up and post the bond after the waiting period. Then we went through a couple more heavy doors, they handed me a thick cotton blanket and locked me in a holding cell. I was the only one in there and it was a very large room with wood laminate flooring, a stainless toilet and sink in one corner, 20 foot white walls, 4 windows embedded with metal mesh on the entry side, lit like a racquetball court and a single camera up in one corner. I just laid down, head swirling with all that had just happened.

About 4 hours later an officer opened up the door and led me out. I was a little groggy but still with it. Back in the in-processing station there was a young lady that they had brought in sitting on the bench and as soon as we walked in she flopped down on the floor and started crawling around wildly. The officer and I just walked around her but I noticed that she wasn't cuffed and wondered why nobody was restraining her. She was obviously out of her mind on something and who knows she could have crawled over and bit me or something. I got a bag of all my stuff, signed a release and went out to where my ride had been patiently waiting for over an hour and 1/2. We paid the bond of $100 but there was another $20 fee that needed to be paid at the police station in order to release my car, except it was too early and nobody was available to take that payment yet. So we went home, crashed a few hours and then drove back to the police station so we could pay the $20 fee so that we could go find the towing company and pay their $85 fee to actually get my car back.

Costs:

Bond	$100
Vehical Release	$20
Towing	$85
Total	$205

The bills start piling in

And many are completely unjustified. Sure everyone knows a DUI is going to cost you a bundle, but you might be surprised at how many different people have their hand out simply because you f*cked up. They know that you just want to make this go away so you can get back on with life. They also know exactly how much they can get away with charging you if you are employed, a home owner, married, etc. In every aspect of dealing with this it has always been apparent that the only thing anyone cares about is getting money. The court even had a mandatory financial profile sheet that I had to fill out that included income, debts and assets. It wasn't very specific requiring financiers or account numbers so it was pretty easy to pad it in the red as far as debt to income, which isn't that far from fact in my case, but I highly doubted it would be checked nor make any difference in my fees. I'm sure I was being charged the maximum allowable fees for the offense. While most of the fees might be standardized by law, spreading the wealth is not, and there is a plethora of 3rd parties that they can order you to pay. Like drug testing companies (owned by people with ties to the court), counseling, community service (yes even this costs money) and court rehabilitation programs (founded by a judge).

The first bill I got in the mail was from the police station for $450. Talk about unjustified! This is a tax-payer funded public police department, how can they bill me directly? They called it a Cost Recovery Invoice and clearly stated that "this invoice is in addition to all court costs and fines". They are charging me for pulling me over and incarcerating me?... as I double checked the envelope looking for a packet of anal lubricant! I even tried to fight this fee by asking what the Cost Recovery fee is for a speeding violation, "there is none", well that's what I was pulled over for so I shouldn't be charged this fee. I was talking to a brick wall.

The next one came from the state and was poetically named Driver Responsibility Fee with some law codes so you knew there was no getting out of it and that some governor signed this into law at some point. This one is for $500, again over and above any other fines levied for the offense. Where does this money go?  And something that they don't immediately specify on the bill is that this is 1/2 of the total fee, they bill you again 6 months later for another $500. I'm helping somebody enjoy their yacht no doubt. They do allow a payment plan if you call, and they are quite friendly about it. I used that to reduce the shock of this expense to $100 per month.

At this point I cringed every time I checked the mail. What's next? Well there's a Drivers License Reinstatement fee of $125, to be paid to the Secretary of State at the end of the license restriction, which in my case was 3 months.

A couple local DUI lawyers sent me some ads in the mail, which was disturbing. I guess this is all public record now, but I didn't realize that it would be that public. I worried what else I would get.

Costs:

Bond	$100
Vehicle Release	$20
Towing	$85
Lawyer	$1500
Police Dept Cost Recovery Fee	$450
State 1/2 of Driver Responsibility Fee	$500
SOS License Reinstatement Fee	$125
Total	$2780

What driving with a .100 BAC and later testing positive for weed got me.

Here is a summary all the crap the court has put me through.

• When all is said and done I will have been drug tested about 100 times ($10 each).
• Holiday BAC (blow in a hand-held) testing ($5 each time) 5 to 8 times, both am and pm, on various holidays including the super bowl. Plan nothing but that on those holidays.
• (PRE-TREATMENT) I had to attend a mandatory 3 day pre-counseling class ($60) that trained you how to find and manipulate your way into substance abuse counseling. Counselors seem to be wary of people who are court ordered to go to counseling so you need to not entirely tell the truth to get in the door, and then tell them you are court ordered so they can report to your PO. This class is worse than useless and I recommend not using anything they say and just ask your PO to recommend one or pick one from the court list because anything else won't be accepted. 
• (LIFE ADJUSTMENT) Go to 12 sessions of counseling (mine is $50 each).
• (AA - NA) Find and attend AA meetings two times a week and have someone there sign your AA attendance sheet for the court. ($1 donation each time) This runs the entire length of my 18 month probation and is quite frankly, hell. This is highly religious in nature and my personal take on it is that replacing something that makes you stupid with something designed to keep you stupid is just plain stupid. Aside from that, going to the same group all the time, I'm getting to know some of the people and most of them are pretty cool.
• Visit my parole officer (PO) once a month so they can copy my drug testing and AA meeting sheets and set the next date. Mine is friendly enough and so far straight-up about answering any questions I have. I always try to come up with questions each time I visit, usually stuff I already know the answer to, but just to confirm and double check so I don't get in any more trouble. After all the court fees are paid off my PO switched to every other month reporting in person. Then in the off months I filled out the report sheet, scanned that, my testing and AA sheets and email it to him. You can fax, email or snail mail around the middle of the month.
• 50 hours community service ($15 per day). You pay for this in your court fees so usually by the time you get to doing this it's already paid for. They give you a log sheet with a raised seal on it, treat it like gold because it's the only record you'll have of your service hours. Pick a place from the list of places, but pick wisely as some of them can suck. I chose a church and it usually consisted of a lot of cleaning and moving things around. I heard from others that the state parks are a workout (shoveling sh*t), High Schools are not bad and the police and fire stations are a nightmare.
• The cost total will be about $6000 when all is said and done.

So far all of the people I've met in AA that have had a DUI have had more than one DUI, not a lot of them, not even most of them, ALL of them! 

Just 3 or 4 beers is all it takes to blow a .08 and that's all they need... BAC Charts

Some tips I've learned along the way:
1) Keep all of your paper work. Especially stuff you have had signed. PO's will try to take your paper work. Ask them to make copies and let you keep the originals. Reason is: if you don't have it, someone else can loose it, and you'll have to do it all over again.
2) Stay positive. It's a big bunch of bull shit but take it in stride and try to always talk about it in a positive light. Negativity will only make things worse.
3) Your PO isn't always going to guide you. I've heard many stories of people violating their probation due to being late with community service because they forgot about it or didn't get their sheet from the PO until late in the sentence. Be it sketchy stories or PO's jerking around, either way it's in your best interest to stay on top of things.
4) Stand your ground in AA, there are a lot of people who will pounce on you if you seem at all weak or insecure. They want to help but really they want to sell you the AA bible and get you into their religion. If that's your thing then fine, if not you will have to fend them off all the time. It sucks to be court ordered to put up with this kind of conflict and walking on egg shells at every meeting so you don't offend their delicate religion. For me this is by far the worst punishment of this whole ordeal.
5) If you have a Michigan Medical Mariana card get it revoked. It is beyond useless and you cannot buy a gun nor get a CPL if you have it.
Send a written request along with your card and a copy of your photo ID to
MMMW
P.O. box 30083
Lansing, MI 48909

They will send a letter back in about 2 weeks.