THE SUSPENSION IS AUTOMATIC. YOUR COMMUTE IS NOT.
Portsmouth runs on schedules that do not match a bus timetable. Shipyard shifts, hospital rotations, deliveries, trades. The suspension attached to a first-offense DUI is mandatory, and for a lot of people in this city it is the sharpest part of the whole penalty — sharper than the fine, and arriving considerably sooner than anything a judge decides. A restricted license is often available, but it is something to be argued for by somebody who has argued for one here before.
The charge itself is a Class 1 misdemeanor under § 18.2-266, carrying the suspension, a fine, and a referral to the Virginia Alcohol Safety Action Program. It is arraigned within days, and the stretch between the arrest and that date is where the work with any purchase in it sits: the grounds for the stop, how the field sobriety tests were actually administered, and the calibration and maintenance record of the instrument that produced the reading. Those records exist. Asking for them has a window.
Reckless driving is the charge people misread most often. Under § 46.2-862 it is not a traffic infraction at all but a criminal misdemeanor — twenty over the posted limit, or eighty-five and above regardless of what the limit happens to be. On Route 164 or the open runs through the west of the city, eighty-five is not an act of recklessness so much as an inattentive minute. The result is still a criminal record that an employer can pull.
WHAT IS REALLY ON THE TABLE
THESE COURTS SEE THIS CHARGE EVERY SINGLE WEEK
Virginia recorded 14,602 DUI convictions during 2024 according to DMV figures, alongside 231,874 speeding convictions — the second of those up better than twenty percent inside a single year. Being one of a very large number is no comfort at all individually. What it does mean is that these dockets are entirely familiar with the charge and have settled expectations about how it ought to be handled, which is a thing worth knowing before you walk in.
Familiar is not the same as automatic. A court that hears a hundred of these knows immediately which files have been worked and which have been carried in that morning, and that read affects what gets offered. It also means the arguments that land are specific rather than general — a documented gap in the instrument’s maintenance history is worth more here than any amount of explanation about how unlike yourself you were that evening.
We are in this courthouse regularly, and that is the whole of the claim we are making. If you were charged in Portsmouth, the first call costs nothing and does not commit you to us. What it should get you is a straight account of what the suspension will actually do to your week, whether a restricted license is realistic, and what has to be requested before the window on it closes.
DECKER LAW IN PORTSMOUTH:
DEFENDING CLIENTS SINCE 1961
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41,000+
criminal clients represented firmwide since 1995
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4
years one of our attorneys spent as a prosecutor
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65+
years of winning cases in Portsmouth
ASK US WHAT’S NEXT
Ask us about a restricted license before the first appearance, not after it. Free, confidential, any hour — 757-622-3317.