Years ago, when I was still a paramedic with the fire department, we would occasionally draw blood from patients and turn it over to the police. More than once, I drew a resisting patient’s blood while a police officer held a taser to their neck.
Why would I do that, you ask?
Florida has long had a specific statute, § 316.1933, covering crashes involving death or serious bodily injury. It provides that when an officer has probable cause to believe an impaired driver caused a death or serious bodily injury, the officer shall require a blood test. The statute also expressly authorizes the officer to use reasonable force if necessary, and it authorizes physicians, nurses, paramedics, and other qualified personnel to draw the blood at the officer’s request. It also grants immunity to those assisting with the draw when acting under the statute at the direction of a law enforcement officer.
For many years, the prevailing view, based largely on the earlier U.S. Supreme Court decision in Schmerber v. California (1966), was that alcohol dissipating from the bloodstream created an exigency justifying a warrantless blood draw in many DUI cases. The person’s liver was literally destroying the evidence every minute, and the delay in obtaining a warrant was the difference between a DUI homicide and a drunk walking away.
I understood why the law was there, and I also disagreed with it. My favorite quote is “better 1,000 guilty go free than 1 innocent person be convicted.” The truth is that the DUI law changes have had no discernible effect on the rate of traffic fatalities. Of course, the fact that the government uses traffic offenses as a cash cow, with Florida making $100 million a year from traffic tickets has nothing to do with it. In California, it was discovered that 1,600 DUI checkpoints yielded only 3,200 DUI arrests (two per checkpoint), but resulted in $40 million in traffic tickets and 24,000 vehicle confiscations. Cops also won, being paid $30 million in overtime to staff the checkpoints.
That was the law when I retired from the fire department in 2011. Then in 2013, the Supreme Court decided Missouri v. McNeely. The Court held that the natural metabolization of alcohol by itself does not automatically create an exigency. Instead, officers generally need a warrant unless the facts of the particular case make obtaining one impractical.
After McNeely, Florida appellate courts repeatedly held that, despite § 316.1933, the State still had to show either:
- a warrant,
- valid consent,
- or a recognized exception to the warrant requirement (such as genuine exigent circumstances).
15 Comments
oldvet50 · July 16, 2026 at 4:59 pm
I find it hard to believe that you would want someone to walk away from any culpability if a loved one of yours died as a result of a DUI collision. For vehicular manslaughter the prosecution must prove the vehicle was operated in a “reckless manner likely to cause the death of, or great bodily harm to, another person”. Seems like a low bar that a good defense attorney could surmount. For DUI manslaughter, the prosecution only needs to prove the driver was impaired (Blood Alcohol Content ≥ 0.08 or normal faculties impaired) and that the operation of the vehicle caused the death. Without any proof of BAC, that charge would be off the table. I guess this would be an example of one of the 1,000 guilty that gets to go free. I have no respect for anyone’s ‘rights’ when they decide to drive drunk – as far as I’m concerned, they willfully forfeited their own rights when they decided to endanger everyone around them.
Divemedic · July 16, 2026 at 5:13 pm
It doesn’t take that long to get a warrant. They can be gotten over the phone in just a few minutes. The fact that someone is dead is no excuse for trampling on everyone’s rights. Until you are the one being held down with a Taser to your neck. But hey, someone said you looked drunk, so you have no rights. Amirite?
The gun banners use the same exact appeals to emotion. I thought my readers were better than that, but I guess not.
oldvet50 · July 17, 2026 at 7:25 am
I guess I’m OK with that.
Officer: “Hey judge, sorry to bother you so late but I came across this guy tonight that caused a wreck and he looks really drunk!”
Judge: “Do I know him?”
Officer: “I doubt it. I’m on scene now and his license says he’s ‘Joe Schmoe’. Anyway, I need a warrant”
Judge: “You’re right, I don’t know him. Warrant granted.”
Is that what you mean?
Divemedic · July 17, 2026 at 7:55 am
If you are hoping to eliminate graft and corruption that allows some guilty people to go free, that isn’t going to happen. The difference is that later, the accused person’s lawyer can attack the basis for the warrant, because the application for the warrant is on record. If you just allow a cop to stomp all over the fourth and fifth amendments because he feels like it, then no one has any rights at all.
I hope that boot tastes good.
tom · July 16, 2026 at 6:42 pm
Either everyone has rights, that must be respected ,or no one does.
McChuck · July 17, 2026 at 4:33 am
“better 1,000 guilty go free than 1 innocent person be convicted.”
That can be reworded to make its impact more clear:
“Better ten thousand innocent victims than one.”
Joe Blow · July 17, 2026 at 6:20 am
Much to my chagrin, TN has declared it legal for police to forcibly draw blood from your person if they suspect you are under the influence of drugs or alcohol. That is all the recourse they need. I find it egregious and hope it will be struck down in court, however… I also see this as a ‘balloon going up’, or a sign along the road of the police state locking down on society. I am of the opinion t’s only going to get worse from here, not better. Our current (and future prospective) supreme court is a bunch of clowns. We’re fucked.
Divemedic · July 17, 2026 at 7:51 am
Part of it is the conservative notion that cops are all just friendly neighbors who want what’s best for everyone. That’s why you get cops who even think that about other cops, even while they overlook the cops who are breaking the law. At the same time, they assume all criminals are totally evil people who wear black hats and deserve whatever they get. That’s how you get people commenting (even on this blog) about criminals not being deserving of any rights. That’s how you get comments that boil down to: “Why, if that cop says you broke the law, you must have broken the law. Whatever that cop decides to do to you, you must deserve it, because you are a law breaking criminal. The cop says so.”
The left is just as guilty. They think all criminals are just like them: ordinary people who made a one time mistake.
Reality is, of course, far more complicated than that. Everyone, cops and criminals alike, is a complex mix of both good and bad. Cops can be evil people, and criminals can be kindhearted, well-meaning people. That’s why we have courts and trials. That’s the one true and moral purpose of the police: to enforce the laws- all of them- so those accused van have their day in a court that is also ruled by laws.
Steve · July 17, 2026 at 1:44 pm
The other issue is
Parallel construction.
In the US, a particular form is evidence laundering, where one police officer obtains evidence via means that are in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures, and then passes it on to another officer, who builds on it and gets it accepted by the court under the good-faith exception as applied to the second officer.[2] This practice gained support after the Supreme Court’s 2009 Herring v. United States decision.[2]
So you can get convicted even though the method used to collect the evidence is illegal and/or unconstitutional. This method is also used by police who use criminals as Confidential Informants (CI)s. “Go burgle that house, and see what drugs are there”, and then the police get a warrant based on the CI’s say so. Of course, that can be less than trustworthy, see: baby bou bou and the flashbangs.
Divemedic · July 17, 2026 at 5:26 pm
I would say that this is something an average person would be against, but I see people all of the time who don’t have a problem with cops violating the constitution using underhanded tricks to violate the spirit of the rights enshrined in it if it means getting the goods on someone with whom they disagree.
TRX · July 17, 2026 at 8:09 am
We won’t need police once the State withers away, and New Sov… Libertar… Federat… Socia… Progressive Man is ascendant!
Divemedic · July 17, 2026 at 8:09 am
Part of the document says prisons and cops will be defunded. I’m sure that prisons will be replaced with reeducation camps. Who doesn’t like camping, after all?
TRX · July 17, 2026 at 8:24 am
My objection to forced blood draws by police is that the police in general are no longer trustworthy. As I see it, Officer Friendly doing a blood draw at the roadside breaks the chain of evidence right at the top.
Divemedic · July 17, 2026 at 9:26 am
It wasn’t the cop doing the draw. He would grab a paramedic or nurse and have them do the draw, sign the property card, and hand it over to the cop.
Steady Steve · July 18, 2026 at 7:32 pm
Could the paramedic or nurse be called as a witness in a case where the officer decided without cause to get a warrant for a blood draw? And would that paramedic/nurse testify against the officer if, in their opinion, the suspect showed no signs of impairment?
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