Drunk Driving Terms

DUI laws themselves are complex, hard to remember and always changing. Add to it a bunch of drunk driving-related acronyms and you have a world legal mumbo jumbo! But we’d like to help you better understand the terms you’ve probably been hearing since your DUI arrest.

We’ve all heard the term DUI, which stands for driving under the influence. Some states may call drunk driving DWI, which stands for driving while intoxicated. Under the influence and intoxication both refer to alcohol and/or drugs. If your state refers to drunk driving as OMVI, this means operating a motor vehicle while impaired.

OUI stands for operating under the influence. Other states may use the term OWI (operating while intoxicated) when referring to drunk driving. OUID relates specifically to drugs (operating under the influence of drugs) while OUIL is directly related to liquor (operating under the influence of liquor).

If you were charged with drunk driving because of a violation of your state’s “per se” law this means that your blood alcohol content was above your state’s legal limit. Under this violation, you can be convicted of drunk driving without any proof impairing your ability to drive.

If you hear the term UBAL, this means that you were operating a vehicle at an unlawful blood alcohol level. This can be determined through chemical testing of your blood, breath or urine. BAC (blood alcohol content) and BAL (blood alcohol level) can be used interchangeably and this amount is usually expressed in a number reflecting the ratio of milligrams of alcohol in 100 milliliters of blood.

There are many acronyms used to describe breath test devices including breathalyzer, which produces a measurement of your blood alcohol content found through your breath sample. An intoxylizer measures your BAC through infrared spectroscopy. A preliminary breath test or PBT is portable and used by police as an estimate of your BAC; these results are usually not admissible in court.

When police have probable cause to believe you were drinking and driving they will use an FST or field sobriety test. Standardized field sobriety tests SFSTs are recognized by the NHTSA (National Highway Transportation Safety Administration) and they include the HGN (Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus), the One Leg Stand and the Walk and Turn.