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^m^haelmartz
RICHMOND — A law to make conviction of drunken drivers easier passed the House of Delegates by a 3-to-l margin Tuesday, but the law’s chief patron warned drunken driving activists to “cool the rhetoric” after the new law is enacted.
The legislation would lower the blood alcohol level necessary for automatic conviction of drunken driving — the per se doctrine — from. 15 to .10. Any evidence other than a blood or breath test is not admissable in court. The only defense is to challenge the validity of the test.
(A blood alcohol level of .10 is enough to convict drunken drivers now, but pot without giving them the right to present evidence to refute the charge.)
The bill’s passage by the Senate is almost assured, because the Senate already has passed an identical bill, by a vote of 36-2-2. The House bill also has the official blessing of the Baliles administration and the patronage of Del. C. Richard Cranwell (D-Roanoke), an influential lawyer and legislator who guided the bill out of the hostile Courts of Justice Committee on Sunday and through a 2’/2-hour debate on the House floor Tuesday.
But Del. Cranwell, responding to charges by the bill’s opponents that drunken driving activists won’t be satisfied with the change, spoke to spectators in the gallery and asked that organizations lobbying for tougher drunken driving laws ease their public pressure to allow government and the public “to take stock” of efforts to curtail drunken driving on state roads.
92.8%