Defendant Not Obligated to Disclose Prior DWI Conviction, According to New Jersey Appellate Court
A New Jersey appellate court recently considered the question of whether a defendant must inform the court of prior convictions that, under New Jersey law, could result in an enhanced sentence. In an unpublished February 2015 decision, State v. Kane, the court ruled that a defendant charged with driving while license suspended (DWLS) was not obligated to inform prosecutors or the court that the suspension was due to a driving while intoxicated (DWI) conviction. State motor vehicle and criminal statutes include enhanced penalties in certain DWLS cases where DWI was the reason for the suspension. The court rejected the state’s arguments that the defense’s failure to provide this information constituted fraud and a breach of attorney ethics rules.
The defendant was arrested in January 2012 in Ocean City for talking on a cell phone while driving. She was subject to a 10-year suspension of her driver’s license at the time, according to the court, because of multiple DWI convictions. She pleaded guilty to DWLS in municipal court that March. DWLS is normally a “non-indictable offense,” and the judge sentenced her to 30 days in jail, to be served intermittently.
New Jersey law prescribes enhanced penalties for a DWLS if the underlying reason for the license suspension is a DWI offense. About seven months before the defendant’s plea, in August 2011, a new criminal statute became effective that made the defendant’s DWLS offense an indictable offense, with substantially greater penalties. The statute allows prosecution of DWLS as a fourth-degree crime, as opposed to a traffic offense, if the license suspension was due to DWI, and the defendant has one or more prior DWLS convictions.
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