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People v. Helm9/21/1981
e driver's compliance with roadside sobriety testing gives tangible evidence of his physical condition. People v. Ramirez, supra. His refusal to comply leaves the officer with little choice but to complete a formal arrest, if the available facts support it, and to enforce the implied consent law. In either circumstance, the safety of the driver and the public is, and should be, the primary concern of the officer.
The type of consent which the majority imposes as a constitutional prerequisite to roadside sobriety testing is frequently described as an exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment. But in the context of the routine enforcement of traffic laws, it becomes a confusing, paradoxical concepot for anyone to grasp, let alone a police officer who is expected to depend upon his understanding of it in practice. A routine automobile stop for traffic investigation purposes is certainly not a situation where an officer comes prepared with warrant in hand. I see no constitutional reason why taking fingerprints, requiring an appearance in a lineup, requiring the production of voice or handwriting exemplars, or extracting blood from unwilling criminal suspects does not require their consent, but a roadside sobriety test, which by its very nature depends upon the cooperation o its participant, does.
I would reverse the trial court because the police officer in this case conducted his traffic investigation in accord with the Fourth Amendment. See Stone v. People, supra. The test itself was not an unreasonable intrusion upon the defendant's privacy, given the purpose of the detention. The defendant's "consent" to take the test is not a constitutional prerequisite to his performance of it. See People v. Sanchez, supra.
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