NJ Case Law - State v. Marquez

Nature of Case:
Failure to submit to a breathalyzer test

Facts:
Marquez's car struck another vehicle in the rear. Officer Lugo arrived and asked Marquez for his driving credentials. He noticed that Marquez slurred his words and had to lean on something to move around. Lugo requested Marquez to perform sobriety tests, but Marquez appeared not to understand Lugo. Lugo arrested Marquez and took him down to the station where he read to him the required paragraphs for breath test to which Marquez replied "I do not understand" in Spanish. Defendant was issued summonses for driving while intoxicated ("DWI"), N.J.S.A. 39:4-50; .refusal to submit to a breath test, N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2; .and careless driving, N.J.S.A. 39:4-97.

Procedural History
Defendant was convicted of all charges. The municipal judge relied on State v. Nunez to find that defendant's lack of understanding of English was .immaterial,. given the requirements of the implied consent law as a condition of licensure. Marquez appealed his N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2 conviction. On appeal, the Law Division judge rejected Marquez.s statutory interpretation and Due Process arguments. Marquez appealed. The Appellate Division affirmed the conviction and found that the officers are not required to read the warning in any language other than English and that the Due Process was satisfied. Marquez appealed to the New Jersey Supreme Court.

Issue(s):
Whether the language of N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2 requires a translation of the standard warning?

Whether the refusal to submit to a breathalyzer test statement must be translated into a foreign language for non-English-speaking drivers in order to satisfy Constitutional Due Process?

Holding
Reversed because N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2 requires that officer "shall inform" the person tested of his rights. The Due Process argument is not reached because this case can be resolved without reaching that argument.

Rationale
"Shall inform" bit of N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2 is an element of 50.4(a) refusal law because the two statutes are .plainly interrelated.. There are three reasons for why the statutes should be read together. First, .the refusal statute requires officers to request motor vehicle operators to submit to a breath test;.the implied consent statute tells officers how to make that request.. Second, the test used by judges in refusal cases is the one provided in the implied consent law. Third, the implied consent law directs officers to inform the drivers of their rights under N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.4(a). Otherwise, the legislative language in N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2(e) would be meaningless. State v. Wright , a refusal case in which the court concluded that "each statute is self-contained" - is distinguished because there the court was analyzing the differences in the language of the two statutes about operating a vehicle and noted the following distinction: .section 50.2 deems that .[a]ny person who operates a motor vehicle. has given consent, whereas section 50.4a applies to situations when an .arresting officer had probable cause to believe that the person had been driving.. State v. Wright, 107 N.J. 488, 490 (1987). In this case, the issue is how the police officers are to ask motorists to submit to a breath test and the statutes must be read together. Next the court interpreted .inform,. in the context of the implied consent and refusal statutes, to mean .[that officers] must convey information in a language the person speaks or understands.. In doing so, the court relied on the plain meaning, legislative history, and its prior decisions. First, the plain meaning of inform means to impart knowledge. This can only be done by speaking the language of the listener because doing otherwise is equivalent to not speaking at all. Second, in looking at the legislative history, the court noticed that the legislature adopted the recommendations of the Motor Vehicle Commission, which recommended more stringent punishments and for that reason it also recommended that police officers .should be required to warn the driver of the possible consequence of refusing to submit to a chemical test.. The court interpreted that as Commission preventing a harsher penalty by conveying knowledge of it to drivers at the scene. Third, the court looked to its decisions in State v. Widmaier and State v. Badessa. The court reasoned that holding that a statement could be read in a language that the driver cannot understand would frustrate both of the above decisions. In Widmaier, the court held that the purpose of the standard warning is a procedural safeguard .to help ensure that defendants understand the mandatory nature of the breathalyzer test.. In Badessa, the court held that the purpose was to .impel the driver to take the test.. Further, the court distinguished State v. Nunez by pointing out that N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.2(e) did not exist at the time.

Notes:

-Defendant may still be convicted of DWI based on the observations of the officer and any other relevant evidence.
-Defendants who claim that they do not speak or understand English must bear the burden of production and persuasion on that issue.


Dissent:

JUSTICE LaVECCHIA dissenting in part and concurring in judgment:

The dissent disagreed with the majority.s view that there is a fourth element to the refusal conviction but concurred in judgment because the one of the officers at the scene apparently spoke Spanish but did not attempt to communicate the warning to the defendant.
The prior decisions of the Supreme Court held that the refusal offense had three elements. Nothing suggests otherwise.
The purpose of the implied consent is remedial and not substantive. Although they are interrelated, that does not mean that the prosecution is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the officer informed the defendant of his rights.
The majority's decision undermines the New Jersey.s implied consent law because the defendant must understand the consequences of his refusal before he can be convicted.
The majority's requirement to translate statements into drivers. language is too harsh on the executive branch. It would make convictions impossible until translation is provided and would require around-the-clock translation services for the police.
The term "inform" means only that the officer must warn the driver in an objectively reasonable manner and not that the driver must subjectively understand the officer. In applying such a standard in this case, the officers were aware that the defendant spoke no English and despite the fact that one of them spoke Spanish to defendant, they made no attempt to translate the warning. Thus, they failed to warn him in a reasonable manner and the conviction should not stand. Facts


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