Q: Is it true you can get a DUI for texting or talking on your phone while driving? I’ve heard that people have gotten arrested for it, and that doesn’t seem right.
A: In 2017 Washington legislators overhauled our distracted driving law which, despite being only being ten years old, was already obsolete. Actually, it was obsolete within weeks of being passed. Back in 2007, when our first distracted driving law was written, it prohibited holding the phone to your ear to talk and sending text messages. That seemed reasonable at the time because the only thing you could do with a cell phone was call and text. That all changed with the launch of the iPhone, which came out in, you guessed it, 2007.
Now you could surf the internet, watch movies, play games and generally just give a large portion of your life to staring at a three-inch screen, and if you did it while driving the law wasn’t clear about whether it was legal or not. As the new law was crafted, it was referred to as “E-DUI,” or driving under the influence of electronics. Nowhere in the actual law does it use those terms; E-DUI is just an informal shorthand way of referring to the law.
I think the intent with “E-DUI” was to acknowledge the seriousness of distraction by comparing it with something we all agree is a serious driving risk. While true, it may have created some confusion. To be clear, you can’t get arrested for DUI by talking on your phone while driving. You can get a traffic infraction, and with good reason; distraction is involved in about 30 percent of traffic fatalities in Washington.
As to the second part of your question, if someone told you they got arrested for using their phone while driving, they left out some critical details in their story. There’s just no legal avenue that gets you directly from talking on the phone while driving to a night in jail. However, using a cell phone while driving could have been the reason for the initial traffic stop.
I don’t know the details to the story you heard, but it’s not hard to imagine that a few extra steps could result in an arrest. Let’s say an officer is following a vehicle and can see the driver holding a phone to their ear. And maybe the vehicle’s speed is inconsistent and drifting from side to side in the lane. Any reasonable person could conclude that the driver is distracted, so the officer pulls over the vehicle.
Now the officer contacts the driver and immediately sees signs of intoxication: strong odor of alcohol, red and watery eyes, slurred speech, difficulty finding their driver license (even though it’s the front-most item in their wallet). At this point the officer shifts from thinking about writing a ticket for distracted driving to starting a DUI investigation. That’s the pathway I can see that gets someone from using a phone while driving to getting arrested for DUI.
Distraction (or any other traffic violation) might be the initial reason for a traffic stop, but if a driver is impaired that becomes the main focus. And with good reason; impaired drivers are involved in over half of all traffic fatalities in the state, even though only a small percentage of drivers ever drive impaired.
Right now law enforcement agencies across the state are conducting extra patrols to get impaired drivers off our roads. But they can’t (and don’t) do it alone. Most Washingtonians, when it a position to prevent impaired driving, take action. That action includes things like offering or coordinating a ride, letting them stay the night, or even calling 911 if they insist on driving. This holiday season, let’s all do our part to make sure the people we love, and the roads they travel on, stay safe.