What Does it Mean Under Michigan Law to Be “Super Drunk”?

On behalf of Law Offices of Derrick E. George, P.C. on Friday, February 17, 2017.

A man who said he was driving home to Ohio – yet was headed northbound on Telegraph Road – had an alcohol level almost four times the legal limit for drunk driving, Bloomfield Township police said.

Christopher Robertson, 46, of Parma, Ohio, was so intoxicated and apparently close to passing out that he could barely stand up and hold his eyes open for a police booking photo before he was allowed to sleep off his vodka-fueled bender, police said.

Police said they caught up to Robertson in busy morning traffic on a weekday last week, at 9:30 a.m. Friday, when other motorists spotted his silver Ford Fusion driving slowly, weaving and nearly sideswiping vehicles trying to pass it on Telegraph near Lone Pine Road. When officers pulled Robertson over, he told them he “drank some vodka the night before” and was on his way back to Ohio, according to a media report from the Bloomfield Township police.

“But he could not explain why he was going north,” the report says. After performing poorly on roadside sobriety tests, Robertson was arrested and taken for a blood test, which registered an astounding .31, police said. That’s nearly four times the legal threshold for drunken driving of .08 and well over Michigan’s level of .17 for “enhanced penalties” under the state’s so-called “Super Drunk Law.”

Because Robertson was so intoxicated, he was immediately transported to a hospital “where he was medically cleared,” police said in the media report. The medical check was a safeguard against alcohol poisoning, which is fatal to about 2,200 Americans each year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.

Robertson then “was held at the police station until he was sober,” according to Bloomfield Township police. Robertson was arraigned at 48th District Court for a hearing scheduled March 15. He could not be reached at apartment listings for him in Parma and Findlay, Ohio. He could face up to 180 days in jail for a first offender of Michigan’s Super Drunk driving charge.