DUI paper trail turns accuracy into a casualty

Sometimes a fingerprint is missing from a state crime report on drunken driving. Or it may be other information vital to keeping drunken drivers off the road that tumbles through the cracks of Utah's fragmented computerized criminal data system as DUI paperwork passes from police officers . . . to the jail . . . to the Utah State driver license division . . . to the Bureau of Criminal Identification . . . to the prosecutor's office . . . to a justice or district court.

"I had no idea that it was as complicated as it seems to be," says Rep. Lamont Tyler, R-Salt Lake City, who heads a committee that will meet this week to get a handle on problems with state drunken driving records. "We've got to get it resolved."

Here's why:

• Robert J. Kent Van Dyke, 34, had been arrested and charged with drunken driving four times before the Jan. 28 West Valley accident that killed 33-year-old Michelle Bradley.

• Israel Ledesma Patrida's drinking and driving problems began in 1992 and continued until Patrida, 26, was jailed earlier this year for killing a 20-year-old University of Utah student.

• Steven Ray Hudgens had 10 prior DUI arrests and was driving on an expired driver's license when he hit and seriously injured three bicyclists in Fruit Heights last year.

These highly publicized cases beg the question of how drivers repeatedly cited for driving under the influence can still be on the road and not under stricter sanctions or even behind prison bars. In each case, prosecutors, judges and other officials blame the communication mess that exists among state agencies, courts and driver license divisions.

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In practice today both BCI (Bureau of Criminal Investigations) and DL (driver license division) databases contain arrest and conviction information, but neither . . . represent a repository of accurate, timely or complete DUI records at a level to support the effective enforcement and adjudication of all DUI cases. In addition, it does not provide the info necessary for an ongoing evaluation of the effectiveness of DUI laws and their enforcement. . . . Moreover, there is not one place that a prosecutor or judge can go to find a complete, accurate and timely record history to be able to determine if enhanced charges should be considered. — From a draft report on DUI records problems to be presented Monday to a subcommittee of the Governor's Council on Driving Under the Influence

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