A recent ruling on a DUI case by a three-judge panel in Duval County is having far-reaching effects.
The panel ruled on Aug. 12 in favor of a defense motion to suppress the breath-test results for a defendant in a DUI-related case.
The judges determined that replacement O-rings on Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office breath-testing machines were mislabeled as maintenance instead of repair.
That means JSO and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Alcohol Testing Program were performing unauthorized repairs on the Intoxilyzer 8000 machines.
That ruling, according to News4JAX news partner Jax Today, means 950 pending DUI cases are now under review in Northeast Florida.
The Breathalyzer machines used at the Duval County jail are sent to FDLE for inspection once a year.
Criminal defense attorney David Robbins told First Coast Connect host Anne Schindler in a recent segment that FDLE was recalibrating faulty Breathalyzers and passing their inspections without notifying anyone that they had been miscalibrated.
“It affects every breath case in this circuit, and, quite frankly, it’s now going to affect every breath test in the state,” Robbins said on First Coast Connect.
He explained that because the FDLE wasn’t keeping records, courts could reconsider cases dating as far back as 2016, when the law changed, making the FDLE no longer authorized to make repairs.
According to Jax Today, FDLE was authorized again in late 2025 after legal challenges.
It’s worth noting that even if a breath-test result is thrown out, that doesn’t mean a DUI charge is automatically dropped because a case can be made on other evidence, such as bodycam footage.
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