A Kentucky Appellate Court recently held that a defendant can examine the source code of the breathalyzer instrument manufactured by CMI, Inc., more commonly known as an Intoxilyzer 5000, so they could challenge the validity of the breath alcohol readings. See Lennie House v Commonwealth of Kentucky, No 2007-CA-000417-DG (Ky App 01/18/2008)
In this case, the defendant sought to discover the source code of the Intoxilyzer 5000 so it could be examined for "bugs" or flaws in the code's logic which could result in an incorrect blood alcohol reading. Kentucky Court's have previously prevented defendant's access to this information, siding with CMI and the Commonwealth of Kentucky that the computer source code is a protected trade secret and that this should weigh against disclosure. However, the Kentucky Court of Appeals stated that the defendant's need for this information could only be quashed upon a showing that providing the information would be unreasonable or oppressive.
Post by Nicholasville Kentucky Attorney Stephen J. Isaacs , Isaacs Law Office.
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Posted by: rider21 | May 20, 2009 at 10:17 AM
Great post about Kentucky Appellate Court recently.
Posted by: DUI Lawyers | November 18, 2008 at 04:40 AM
Any info on how this is helping the defendants? Persons with a .080 or .081? Has the code been released?
Note from Isaacs Law: This helps because defnese attorneys have argued that the local authorities had modified the code and machines to the detriment of the defendant. This was a big issue in the Phoenix, AZ area. Now we can verify the accuracy of the code and the machine.
Posted by: David | February 21, 2008 at 12:42 PM