Westminster DUI Attorney
Kevin Churchill offers a vigorous defense against all DUI charges in the City of Westminster, and in surrounding areas of Adams and Jefferson Counties in Colorado. He is committed to safeguarding individuals accused of drunk driving in Colorado against unwarranted convictions and penalties. We review all the evidence in each case carefully to know how to best advise our clients, and we do not advise clients to plead guilty if there is a reason to fight the case. Although most drunk driving convictions are misdemeanors, they can have significant life-altering effects. These negative consequences not only include the criminal court penalties, but also include other negative effects on employment, relationships, and finances. Typically, people accused of DUI and DWAI in Westminster are ordinary people who need to drive to get to work and financially support themselves and their families.
Kevin Churchill is a DUI attorney who has represented thousands of clients in Westminster and surrounding areas of the Front Range. He has extensive experience handling drunk driving cases for more than 24 years. This gives him the expertise to critically evaluate the evidence in each case in order to give clients the best representation possible.
The DUI laws in Colorado are among the most strict in the United States. If you are convicted of a first-time DUI, criminal penalties can include jail time, a year or more of probation (during which you cannot drink or use drugs), and fines. You will also automatically lose your driver’s license for a period of time, unless your DUI lawyer is able to defeat the revocation case at the DMV. This can be one of the most consequential outcomes of a DUI conviction, because it makes it difficult to do the basic life tasks, including getting to and from work, seeing friends, and taking your kids to school and activities. It should be clear that even a first DUI conviction can have very stressful consequences. It is therefore critical that you hire an attorney who specializes in drunk driving cases to represent you if charged with DUI or DWAI. Kevin Churchill has been representing clients accused of DUI in Westminster and the north Metro area for over two decades. If you are arrested for DUI, DWAI, or DUID, please contact him for a free consultation.
If you are facing DUI charges in Westminster, you need an attorney who specializes in this type of charge. A DUI attorney needs to be both a legal and technical expert. A skilled DUI attorney will have expertise in criminal, evidentiary, and constitutional law. In addition, DUI cases have technical evidence that makes them unique to other criminal cases. Your attorney needs to know the ins and outs of the science of blood alcohol breath tests and blood tests for drugs, as well as how the standardized roadside sobriety tests are supposed to be administered (and when there are flaws in how they were done.) A skilled DUI attorney will evaluate all of the evidence with this goal:
To help you to get the best possible outcome in your case, whether that is reduced penalties, modified charges, or possibly having the case dismissed outright.
The penalties for a DUI conviction can be significant, including jail time, fines, and revocation of your driver’s license. A first conviction for DUI will result in a 9-month loss of your driver’s license. Although Westminster has an RTD hub, it is still overwhelmingly a driving town, and it is challenging to get around without being able to drive yourself. How would you conveniently get to work at Ball or Maxar, shop at the Orchard Town Center, or hang out downtown at the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema if you can’t drive? Any DUI conviction can also result in jail time, however there is mandatory jail time if the blood alcohol content (BAC) was over 0.20 mg/l. But, you can be charged with drunk driving even without blood alcohol test results, and you can also be charged if your BAC is below .08. In addition, if you have a minor child in the car at the time of your DUI arrest, you will also be charged with child abuse. The consequences of getting a DUI, DWAI, or DUID in Westminster can therefore be substantial. It is important to consult with a DUI attorney who is familiar with the local Adams and Jefferson County court system to look at your case. We want to help minimize the consequences you face from your DUI arrest.
Although most DUI charges are misdemeanors, they are still criminal charges in the criminal court system. Aside from criminal and DMV penalties, there are also financial and reputational costs incurred outside of the legal system. For example with significant increases to the cost of auto insurance. A skilled DUI attorney will evaluate all the technical evidence against you to make sure everything was done accurately. This can sometimes result in the charges against you being dropped, or can be used to reduce the penalties you face in case of a conviction.
As soon as you are charged with DUI, you will be at risk of your driver’s license being revoked. If you refused to have your breath or blood tested at the time of arrest, you will have an automatic, mandatory one-year revocation of your driver’s license. If you took a BAC test, you have the right to a DMV hearing to determine if you can keep your license until your criminal case is resolved. However, you must request that hearing within 7 days of being arrested after taking a breath test. (If you took a blood test to assess your BAC, you have 7 days from when your blood test results come back.) When you request the hearing, it is very important that you check the box requesting that the police officer appear at your hearing. This gives your attorney the chance to ask the officer questions that could help your criminal case, and if the officer does not show up, you may not lose your license.
Once you are convicted of a DUI in Westminster, there is a mandatory 9 month revocation of your license. However, recently-changed laws in Colorado allow you to request early reinstatement of your license if you install an interlock device in your vehicle that tests whether alcohol is present before allowing you to drive.
DUI cases can have complex scientific and technical evidence, so hiring an attorney with years of specialized experience with DUI cases can be a valuable asset in making decisions on how to resolve your case.
The cost of a DUI conviction can be overwhelming. The expenses can include court costs, fines, probation fees, interlock device costs, alcohol treatment expenses, increased insurance premiums, loss of wages, losing your job, and more. Most estimates suggest the overall cost of a DUI in Westminster will be over $10,000. So, the cost of hiring a private attorney who is experienced with DUI cases can be small in comparison. DUI cases have specialized evidence, including different types of breath tests for blood alcohol content, blood tests for alcohol and drugs including marijuana, and field sobriety tests. There also must be reasonable suspicion to pull you over, and if there was not, all evidence against you could be inadmissible, and your charges could be dropped. If you are charged with drunk driving, it is critical that you hire an attorney who is experienced with these types of specialized evidence. Your attorney can help to evaluate whether there is a way to fight your case in court, or if there are flaws with procedures or tests that could get your case dismissed. If a conviction cannot be avoided, your attorney will help to get you the best sentence possible.
Serving the Westminster Area
The negative consequences of a DUI conviction can be too significant to simply assume the evidence against you is accurate. We have been able to beat countless cases in which our clients assumed there was no way out of the charges. Our experienced defense team knows that in drug and alcohol driving offense cases, the evidence is complex and requires experts to evaluate it. We will review all of the evidence in your case carefully to make sure all standardized procedures were followed, and all tests were done correctly. We will also look for consistency in the police officer’s statements about the case. Because we have been working in Jefferson and Adams County courts for two decades, we are also familiar with the judges and opposing attorneys, which can also be beneficial in your case. Our goal is to ensure that your case receives the utmost attention and that you have the best possible outcome. If you have any questions or concerns about your case, please contact our office. Mr. Churchill will personally provide advice on how to protect your criminal record and your driver’s license.
If you have not already been arrested, our page entitled “DUI Arrest Advice” offers some helpful tips on what to do. However, if you are now seeking advice on how to protect yourself after an arrest, our website can also provide valuable information.
For more than 20 years, Kevin Churchill has been offering legal representation for DUI and DMV hearings for accused people throughout Westminster and the surrounding North Metro area. He has experience in handling thousands of DUI charges over that time, as well as related criminal charges, such as child endangerment, assault, and felony drug possession.
Westminster is an unusual city, in that about 40% of the population live in Jefferson County, and 60% live in Adams County. If you are arrested for DUI in Westminster, you will have court in either the Jefferson County Court in Golden, or in the Adams County Court in Brighton, based on the location of your arrest. The Westminster Police Department is responsible for law enforcement in Westminster; they have 199 sworn personnel. Through 2019, there were an average of over 400 DUI arrests in Westminster per year, but the numbers have dropped off to about half of that annually since then.
If you are arrested for DUI in Westminster and you choose to do a breath test to measure your Blood Alcohol Content (BAC), you will be brought to the Westminster Police Department and do the test on their Intoxilyzer 9000 machine. This machine is inspected and certified annually by the Colorado Department of Public Health. If you choose to do a blood test, the paramedics from the Westminster Fire Department will do the blood draw. If the driver is taken to the hospital for any reason, then the hospital phlebotomist will do the blood draw. The procedure for the blood and breath tests doesn’t change depending on whether the arrest happens in Adams or Jefferson county.
All of the WPD patrol officers are certified to do the Standardized Field Sobriety Tests (SFST) and to use the Intoxilyzer, and all are trained to investigate DUIs. In addition, Westminster also has four Drug Recognition Experts (DREs), and two of those are also DRE instructors. The State of Colorado funds overtime pay for DUI enforcement, and that is done by the Westminster Police on most Fridays and Saturdays throughout the year, as well as around holidays. Similar to most other locations in the Denver Metro area, Westminster no longer does any DUI checkpoints. The State of Colorado used to fund these checkpoints, but that funding no longer exists. Instead, the WPD does multi-jurisdictional Saturation Patrols with other Adams County law enforcement agencies; these have been shown to be a more effective use of resources than DUI checkpoints.
Jefferson County Court
100 Jefferson County Parkway, Golden, CO 80401
720-772-2500
Adams County Court
1100 Judicial Center Dr., Brighton, CO 80601
303-659-1161
Westminster Municipal Court
3030 Turnpike Dr., Westminster, CO 80030
303-658-2240
Westminster Police Department
Westminster Public Safety Center
9110 Yates St., Westminster, CO 80031
Non-Emergency 303-658-4360
police@cityofwestminster.us
Closest Ignition Interlock Providers to Westminster, CO (Not endorsed by our office):
Honest-1 Auto Care
2925 W 92nd Ave, Federal Heights, CO 80260
720-259-2349
5th Gear Automotive
7301 W 118th Pl, Broomfield, CO 80020
720-259-5824
