{"id":323,"date":"2017-02-16T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-02-16T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baronedefensefirm.lawblogger.net\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/"},"modified":"2025-01-08T14:37:58","modified_gmt":"2025-01-08T18:37:58","slug":"definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/","title":{"rendered":"What it Means to \u201cOperate\u201d a Vehicle In the Context of a Michigan DUI Charge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In some situations, the police can charge you with drunk driving in Michigan even if the police never saw you driving your car.\u00a0 However, the legal analysis in these cases is very fact specific, and the law is quite complex.\u00a0 In some situations, courts have upheld convictions when the police never saw anyone operating the car. But in other cases, courts have held there was no operation. \u00a0To understand why this difference exists, and why a court might allow such a non-witnessed drunk driving case to stand, you need know a few things about the drunk driving laws of Michigan.<\/p>\n<p>To begin with, the crime of drunk driving is called OWI or \u201coperating while intoxicated.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 Michigan does not use the word \u201cdrive\u201d so Michigan\u2019s drunk driving law is not called driving under the influence (DUI), or driving while intoxicated (DWI). \u00a0The word operate is much broader than the word drive. The Michigan Motor Vehicle Code defines \u201coperate\u201d or \u201coperating\u201d as \u201cbeing in actual physical control of a vehicle\u201d whether licensed or not. MCL 257.35a. Thus, the plain language of the statute requires that driver\u2019s actions must establish \u201cactual physical control\u201d of the vehicle.<a href=\"#_edn1\" name=\"_ednref1\">[i]<\/a> \u00a0\u00a0But the analysis doesn\u2019t end there.\u00a0 What happens for example if a person is asleep or unconscious?<\/p>\n<p>A question sometimes raised in this context is whether a sleeping or unconscious driver can be found to be in \u201cactual physical control.\u201d\u00a0 In these cases, which often have unique facts, the Michigan Supreme Court has expanded the term \u201coperation\u201d such that \u2018operating\u2019 is defined in terms of the danger the OUIL statute seeks to prevent: the collision of a vehicle being operated by a person under the influence of intoxicating liquor with other persons or property. Accordingly, \u201c[o]nce a person using a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle has put the vehicle in motion, or in a position posing a significant risk of causing a collision, such a person continues to operate it until the vehicle is returned to a position posing no such risk.\u201d<a href=\"#_edn2\" name=\"_ednref2\">[ii]<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"read_more_link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/\"  title=\"Continue Reading What it Means to \u201cOperate\u201d a Vehicle In the Context of a Michigan DUI Charge\" class=\"more-link\">Continue Reading \u203a<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In some situations, the police can charge you with drunk driving in Michigan even if the police never saw you driving your car.\u00a0 However, the legal analysis in these cases is very fact specific, and the law is quite complex.\u00a0 In some situations, courts have upheld convictions when the police never saw anyone operating the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,6,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dui","category-dui-trials","category-owi"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>What it Means to &quot;Operate&quot; a Vehicle In the Context of An OWI Charge<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Michigan OWI lawyer Patrick Barone discusses the various legal decisions regarding the operation of a vehicle and what it means for those accused of DUI.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"What it Means to &quot;Operate&quot; a Vehicle In the Context of An OWI Charge\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Michigan OWI lawyer Patrick Barone discusses the various legal decisions regarding the operation of a vehicle and what it means for those accused of DUI.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Patrick Barone\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"11 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"What it Means to &quot;Operate&quot; a Vehicle In the Context of An OWI Charge","description":"Michigan OWI lawyer Patrick Barone discusses the various legal decisions regarding the operation of a vehicle and what it means for those accused of DUI.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"What it Means to &quot;Operate&quot; a Vehicle In the Context of An OWI Charge","twitter_description":"Michigan OWI lawyer Patrick Barone discusses the various legal decisions regarding the operation of a vehicle and what it means for those accused of DUI.","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Patrick Barone","Est. reading time":"11 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/"},"author":{"name":"Patrick Barone","@id":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/da00f897e195cfccca02fe556b53136f"},"headline":"What it Means to \u201cOperate\u201d a Vehicle In the Context of a Michigan DUI Charge","datePublished":"2017-02-16T04:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2025-01-08T18:37:58+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/"},"wordCount":2118,"articleSection":["DUI","DUI Trials","OWI"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/","url":"https:\/\/www.baronedefensefirm.com\/blog\/definition-of-driving-in-dui-cases\/","name":"What it Means to &quot;Operate&quot; 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