News that a sober Abbotsford, B.C., police officer tried out the department’s breathalyzer and failed the test is enough to send chills down the spine of any designated driver in this holiday season.
A Vancouver lawyer says the machines police rely on to take drunk drivers off the road and deliver hefty financial penalties are notoriously faulty and things haven’t improved in the year since more than 2,000 were taken out of service for recalibration.
Although access to information documents show a litany of problems with the devices in Vancouver, Abbotsford, Whistler, Kitimat, Kamloops and Port Moody, none of the problems have been reported to the Superintendent of Motor Vehicles, the body that polices roadside penalties.
“This sort of undermines the confidence in the justice system from two different respects because if you’re using a wonky system to collect evidence and you can come to me and I can show you the problems with it, who’s going to trust the system?” asked lawyer Paul Doroshenko.