More than 1,100 British Columbia motorists caught up in tougher drunk driving rules before part of the law was found unconstitutional will have some of their punishments overturned, but their drunk driving penalty still sticks.
The Justice Ministry confirmed Friday at least 1,137 motorists who were required to attend and pay for driver education programs and install ignition-lock systems in their vehicles after failing roadside impaired driving tests no longer need to take those actions — and up to 400 drivers may be in line for refunds.
The two programs add up to a cost of about $2,600.
Last month, the Justice Ministry said the Office of the Superintendent of Motor Vehicles was reviewing some of the penalties for about 1,200 motorists who were handed immediate roadside prohibitions during a three-week period in November 2011 just before the B.C. Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional part of the impaired driving law.
Legal challenges on behalf of 17 of those 1,200 motorists prompted the review and resulted in the decision to overturn the education and interlock ignition penalties.
Stephanie Melvin, deputy superintendent of motor vehicles, said her office decided that in fairness to the 1,137 motorists whose cases occurred during the three-week November 2011 time frame they should have their driver education penalties overturned, but not their impaired driving penalties.
“There were some very strong arguments in the petitions that led us to believe it wouldn’t be fair to keep these drivers referred to the remedial programs,” she said.
Vancouver lawyer Paul Doroshenko said he represented the majority of the 17 people who challenged the decision to send them to driver education and interlock programs.
The Motor Vehicle Act states motorists will be required to attend remedial education courses and install the ignition interlock device, if in the opinion of the motor vehicle superintendent, the driver’s record in unsatisfactory.
Doroshenko said he has clients whose driving record has been incident free for years except for the failure of the roadside impaired driving test and they were still sent letters to attend the remedial courses and interlock programs.
He said he is now considering mounting test cases from several of the 35,000 motorists who were sent to the courses and forced to install interlock programs since September 2010 when the law was introduced.
“If everybody who’s got an immediate roadside prohibition has to do it, then it wouldn’t be discretionary,” Doroshenko said.