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600 W. 13th Street Austin, Texas 78701 Corner of West 13th Street and Nueces.

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Board Certified - Criminal Law - Texas Board of Legal Specialization

Criminal Law Blog

October 09, 2005

A Criminal Defense Lawyer Who Can Do a Cop’s Job?

I just received a certificate showing that I have completed the Standardized Field Sobriety Testing Practitioner course.  That course is sanctioned by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration / International Association of Chiefs of Police and is the same course that all police officers, nationwide, take. 

The course was taught by Troy Walden, Ph.D. and Lance Platt, Ph.D., two of the nation’s leading experts in the field of training both police officers and other folks how to administer the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s ("NHTSA") Standardized Field Sobriety Tests ("SFSTs").

Unlike most continuing legal education, to pass this course, everyone had to take both a written and a practical exam. 

To pass the practical exam, students had to demonstrate 100% proficiency.  Anything less than demonstrating 100% proficiency meant that the student would go home, no certificate in hand.  Dr. Walden and Dr. Platt ran the SFST training program for all of Texas before going out on their own. 

Here is how this benefits my clients.  Most clients come to my office figuring they must have failed the SFSTs, including the “pen test,” but many don’t understand how they could have failed.

Now I can administer the “pen test,” also known as the Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus ("HGN") test.  “Nystagmus” simply means involuntary jerking of the eyeball.  The HGN test looks for that eyeball-jerking when the suspect’s eyes are drawn into a horizontal gaze.  Every human being has a certain amount of nystagmus, but some have more than others. 

When a person drinks, the eyeball jerks around noticeably more and for a longer time.  And that is what the HGN test is supposed to determine: whether there is so much more eyeball-jerking that the suspect is more likely to be impaired by alcohol. 

Now I can determine whether my client has a bit more than the ordinary, natural nystagmus that we all have.  This would help to explain why an officer saw the nystagmus he says he saw, but interpreted it mistakenly. 

With the training I received from Walden, Platt & Associates, I can also administer the “walk-and-turn” test and the “one leg stand” test exactly according to NHTSA standards.  Which means I know the limitations of the tests.  And I know when the tests are not being administered correctly. 

NHTSA itself says that the scientific validation of the SFSTs applies only when the tests are administered in the prescribed, standardized manner, and that if any one element of the SFSTs is changed, the validity is compromised. 

If the police are sloppy about administering the tests, then the tests should not be admitted into evidence, much less given any weight by a jury. 

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