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THE SO-CALLED TWO-HOUR RULE, REQUIRING THE REQUEST FOR A DWI BREATH TEST BE MADE AND THE REFUSAL WARNINGS BE GIVEN WITHIN TWO HOURS OF ARREST, DOES NOT APPLY TO THE ADMINISTRATIVE LICENSE REVOCATION HEARINGS HELD BY THE DEPARTMENT OF MOTOR VEHICLES (DMV); THEREFORE THE FACT THAT THE PETITIONER WAS ASKED TO TAKE THE BREATH TEST AND WAS GIVEN THE REFUSAL WARNINGS THREE HOURS AFTER ARREST DID NOT PRECLUDE THE DMV FROM CONSIDERING PETITIONER’S TEST REFUSAL (CT APP).

The Court of Appeals, in a full-fledged opinion by Judge DiFore, over a dissenting opinion, determined the so-called two-hour rule does not apply to a driver’s license revocation administrative hearing after a DWI arrest. Within two hours of arrest the police can warn the driver that a refusal to submit to the blood-alcohol breath test is admissible at trial. If the request to submit to the test is made and the refusal warnings are given more than two hours after arrest, however, the refusal is not admissible at trial. Here the petitioner refused the DWI breath test three hours after arrest, after the refusal warnings were given. He argued the two-hour rule should apply and the refusal should not be considered at the Department of Motor Vehicle’s (DMV’s) administrative license revocation hearing:

Petitioner’s reliance on the statutory interpretation analysis in People v Odum [31 NY3d 344] as support for a motorist’s substantive right to refuse a chemical test without consequence is misplaced. Odum addressed the admissibility at trial of the results of a chemical test administered more than two hours after the defendant’s arrest, and whether the refusal warnings, including the inaccurate warning regarding the use of any refusal at a criminal trial, as given to him rendered his consent to the test involuntary. We emphasized that the 1973 statute authorizing the admissibility of evidence of a test refusal at a criminal trial was in derogation of common law and concluded as a result that the statutory provision authorizing such admission—Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1194 (2) (f)—had to be strictly construed to include the two-hour rule … . In stark contrast, the limitation on the scope of the revocation hearing in section 1194 (2) (c) is not in derogation of the common law and is a subsequently enacted provision that specifically governs the issues that may be considered at an administrative hearing … . Matter of Endara-Caicedo v Vehicles, 2022 NY Slip Op 00959, CtApp 2-15-22

 

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