I break down how the state of Ohio's approach to recreational and medical marijuana intersects with OVI laws.

Despite marijuana being legal under state law, driving under the influence remains a legal gray area. I explain the two main types of offenses: operating a vehicle while high and having a prohibited concentration of THC or its metabolites in your system.

With drug recognition experts often under scrutiny for their methods, attorneys challenge these cases while different jurisdictions handle them differently. I offer essential advice on navigating Ohio's tricky landscape of pot-related DUI charges.

And remember, when faced with such charges, getting legal assistance is key.

Key Takeaways:

• Understanding the Law: Like alcohol, marijuana-related OVI can be charged if you're under the influence or have a prohibited concentration of THC/metabolites in your system.
• Proving Influence: It's tricky to prove marijuana impairment since THC can linger. Police use "Drug Recognition Experts" (DREs), but their methods can be challenged.
• Legal Defense: If facing an OVI charge, it's essential to hire a competent Ohio lawyer to navigate the complexities and challenge the evidence effectively.

Submit your questions to www.lawyertalkpodcast.com.

Recorded at Channel 511.

Stephen E. Palmer, Esq. has been practicing criminal defense almost exclusively since 1995. He has represented people in federal, state, and local courts in Ohio and elsewhere.

Though he focuses on all areas of criminal defense, he particularly enjoys complex cases in state and federal courts.

He has unique experience handling and assembling top defense teams of attorneys and experts in cases involving allegations of child abuse (false sexual allegations, false physical abuse allegations), complex scientific cases involving allegations of DUI and vehicular homicide cases with blood alcohol tests, and any other criminal cases that demand jury trial experience.

Steve has unique experience handling numerous high publicity cases that have garnered national attention.

For more information about Steve and his law firm, visit Palmer Legal Defense.

Copyright 2025 Stephen E. Palmer - Attorney At Law

Steve Palmer here, Lawyer Talk. Another episode of our DUI OVI 360. We're gonna call this the 4:20 edition. What does that mean? We're gonna talk about smoking pot and DUIs, at least here in Ohio, and, how it works. So Ohio's had this, we'll call it an emergence of recreational marijuana. So like many states, Ohio's gone gone green, so you can smoke recreationally marijuana here in Ohio. And for the last several years, we've had, medical marijuana as well. That means that people are smoking pot, and they're doing it lawfully, at least under state law.

Whole different episode on what the feds are doing with this and whether it's still a federal crime it is, but we'll deal with that a different day. This is this is created all sorts of questions, all sorts of issues about people driving while under the influence or, or at least driving while high, driving under the influence of marijuana and Ohio's OVI laws. So let me sort of break this down. It's it's really similar to alcohol. So alcohol related OVI is you can get charged in one of two ways. I'm simplifying it, but really one of two categories. You've got the the old fashioned way where you're just under the influence of alcohol and you shouldn't be driving. That's what your granddad would know about.

And then you've got another offense called a per se offense that says you can't operate a car with a prohibited concentration of alcohol in your blood, breath, or urine. Marijuana works sort of similarly. The first type of offense, if you're just high and the police can somehow prove that, you're under the influence of marijuana, then you shouldn't be driving and it's a crime or an OVI or, you know, high owned OVI to be operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of marijuana. That's the easy one. The more complicated one is if you have a prohibited concentration of THC in your system. And there's really two ways Ohio does this. It gets sort of confusing, but I'll try to make it simple. The first way is if you just have, flat marijuana in your system or THC in your system, And, there's a you have to have two nanograms per milliliters of urine or two nanograms per milliliters of blood in your system of of just THC.

And then they have something called metabolites, marijuana metabolites. So once you ingest marijuana, your body goes through this, chemical breakdown process of eliminating it from your system and it leaves behind metabolites. So you've metabolized it and it leaves behind remnants chemically that you've had THC or marijuana in your system. And the law also tests for that. So there's two ways you can have that per se type of offense. The first would be, if you've got a prohibited concentration directly, the second being, a metabolite. And then I guess there's a final category that combines them all. You could you could be under the influence and have a prohibited concentration while driving.

Now the question everybody asks is, wait a minute. How are they gonna prove that I was high at the time I was driving just by looking at what's in my what's in my urine or what's in my blood? Because we all know that marijuana, stays around for a while. Well, that's where it gets sort of dicey. We as lawyers look at this, and we try to challenge the per se values. We try to challenge whether the police can actually prove somebody is under the influence of alcohol, And it gets more difficult because even if you appear to be completely fine, you don't look high, you're not eating Doritos while you're driving down the road and everything else looks normal, how do they actually prove you're under the influence? Well, you know, evidence is evidence. The police have created these this category of experts called drug recognition experts or DREs, where in theory, they can come in and they do a series of voodoo, eye testing and, some other things. And they say, I hereby think that this guy is under the influence of drugs. You can tell my skepticism with this.

But, anyway, they they try to do this, and we try to challenge it. I don't have a good answer for this, folks. All I know is that we fight these cases. We do our best, and, it's not always easy. Clearly, the as I've said before, first, do no harm. If you're smoking pot going down the road and you get pulled over and the car's gonna reek like weed, you're probably in trouble. So the best the best, defense is is not to do it. But if it does happen, lawyers in Ohio, we're learning how to deal with this, and, we know how to challenge this stuff.

Different jurisdictions are treating it differently, but, it is a concern. Don't think just because it's recreationally permissible, you're gonna get a pass for having metabolites or marijuana in your system. You won't. The best advice I give anybody when they're charged with OBI is go hire a lawyer. Hire me if you want. Hire somebody that's competent. Either way, get some help because it's not easy. Anyway, DUI three sixty four twenty edition, lawyertalkpodcast.com.

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