The Texas Legislature has given the police the authority to take DWI suspects blood against their will and with out a warrant in more circumstances. Now, if a person is charged with a DWI with Child Passenger, a third DWI, and cases in which a driver has caused serious bodily injury to another person the police can force them to take blood and they do not need a judges permission. The question is who can take the blood. The law provides that a person qualified to take blood can draw the blood. Some police agencies will undoubtedly try and train their officers to take blood.

There are all kinds of potential problems with the accuracy of blood tests. First of all, normally when people take blood they swab the area that they are going to extract blood with a disinfectant. The disinfectant normally contains alcohol. This alcohol can get into the blood draw and contaminate it with more alcohol. This will raise the level of alcohol present in the specimen. Second, when you place the blood into the vial the vial is obviously not empty. It contains a chemical. This chemical is designed to prevent coagulation. Coagulation is when the blood clumps and does not maintain its consistency. When this happens, it can raise the amount of alcohol found in the specimen.

The Houston Crime Lab has such a great reputation for excellence that they have determined that instead of using an outside laboratory whose work has been checked, they will instead make their own blood kits. So, we are trusting them to get it right.

Once, you obtain the blood and put in the vial you have to handle it correctly and store it correctly. You can not expose the blood to a great deal of heat. It is supposed to be refrigerated. Of course, we can count on the brilliant minds of law enforcement to screw this up also.