CDA
January 02, 2023
Failures in the custody of DGT drug test samples are causing many drivers to get off scot-free.
Legal problems for the Directorate General of Traffic (DGT). According to The Objective, there are “Repeated and various failures in the chain of custody of drug tests”which are causing the annulment of fines for drivers sanctioned for driving with drugs in their bodies.
According to this medium, there have been at least four cases in the last few months in which the DGT did not provide any certification of having complied with the chain of custody of the saliva samples with which the agents carry out the drug test.
Drivers Are Winning Cases
Examples of this malpractice are drug tests that spend more than two weeks in the warehouses of a transport company or in laboratories until they are collected and returned to the Superior Traffic Headquarters; or samples that do not coincide with those carried out by traffic agents at the foot of the road.
Pedro Javaloyes, spokesman for Dvuelta, the company in charge of appealing fines, maintains, in statements collected by The Objective, that “it is truly alarming to see how the neglect of the DGT in something key such as the chain of custody of a drug detection test, it is not a specific case ”.
Precisely Dvuelta has won four sentences of this type to the DGT. “For the DGT it must be very expensive to comply with its obligation as a sanctioning body. Fortunately, the courts, time and time again, put the body in its place », he added.
One of the latest cases concerns a driver who had been penalized for driving under the influence of narcotic substances. with a fine of 1,000 euros and the loss of 6 points of the driving license.
Drivers will be able to be recorded in the new drug controls
He decided to appeal the sanction using as the main argument that the chain of custody had been broken of the saliva sample that the Civil Guard agents took from him to carry out the test in which he tested positive for drugs.
The judgment has confirmed that it took 6 days for the sample to be delivered to the carrier since it was taken. For the judge, this period of time was excessive and unjustified. In addition, the Provincial Traffic Office of Valencia, as stated in the resolution, has not accredited during the trial the state and conditions of conservation of the sample during those days.
