Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office

Impaired Driving

The Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office aggressively prosecutes those who drive their vehicles while impaired due to drugs, alcohol, or a combination of the two. In 2006, 78 juveniles and 3,531 adults in Utah were arrested for Driving Under the Influence (DUI) according to the Utah Department of Public Safety. The statistics for the first half of 2007 indicate that DUI crimes are on the rise. From January to June 2007 alone, 66 juveniles and 3,555 adults were arrested for Driving Under the Influence.  

The Utah Department of Public Safety also reports that there were 2,065 alcohol and other drug-related crashes in Utah in 2005. Those incidents resulted in 1,143 injuries and 45 fatalities; that’s an alcohol or drug-related crash every four hours. Occupants of vehicles involved in those crashes were twice as likely to sustain injuries as occupants of vehicles involved in regular traffic collisions. Additionally, alcohol and drug-related crashes were 6 times more likely to be fatal than other types of crashes.

In Salt Lake County, there are five main laws we commonly used to prosecute people who drive while under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol:

•    Driving Under the Influence  (Utah Code §41-6a-502)
•    Driving With Any Measurable Controlled Substance  (Utah Code §41-6a-517)
•    Reckless Driving  (Utah Code §41-6a-528)
•    Driving With Any Measurable Controlled Substance and Causing Serious Bodily Injury or Death  (Utah Code §58-37-8(g))
•    Automobile Homicide  (Utah Code §76-5-207)

The sentence a person receives upon conviction of one of these crimes depends on a number of different factors, including the existence of prior convictions, the severity of any injuries caused, and the degree of negligence exercised by the driver.