People v. Rea
Docket No. 153908
Trial Lawyer's Takeaway: you can be charged with OWI in your own driveway
The question in Rea is whether you can be charged with drunk driving under Michigan law when driving your own car in your own driveway.
Police showed up at Gino Rea’s house in response to a noise complaint. As the police walked up the driveway, Rea began backing his car down it. The police shined a flashlight to alert Rea, who then stopped the car. When the officers approached, they noticed the smell of alcohol on Rea’s breath and other indicia of intoxication. The blood test revealed a .242 BAC.
The Michigan statute, MCL 257.625(1), forbids an intoxicated person from operating a vehicle “upon a highway or other place open to the general public or generally accessible to motor vehicles, including an area designated for the parking of vehicles.” The majority opinion, written by Justice Bernstein for four justices, said the ordinary meaning of the phrase “generally accessible” meant “usually capable of being reached.” The Court said the statute is not concerned with private property because the modifier “motor vehicles” “shows that the focus is not whether most people can access the area, but whether most motor vehicles can access the area.” Therefore, whether a person has permission to enter the area is irrelevant.
This conclusion, the Court stated, is supported by the statute’s wording, which distinguishes between places “open to the general public” (which would not include private driveways) and places “generally accessible to motor vehicles” (which would include private driveways). Given that Rea’s driveway is “a place motor vehicles are usually capable of entering,” Rea violated the statute. That the officers were blocking Rea’s exit did not prevent the driveway from being “generally accessible to motor vehicles.”
Justice Larsen concurred in the judgment only. She was concerned that the majority’s opinion went too far in defining the contours of the meaning of “generally accessible to motor vehicles.” For example, “[a] car may be physically capable of barreling down a barricade or crashing into someone’s living room.” Larsen would have defined it as “readily” or “easily” accessible. Her chief concern was that the majority “focuse[d] not on ease, but on capability.”
Justice McCormack authored a dissent joined by Justice Viviano. She wrote that the majority’s interpretation gives no effect to the word “generally,” but rather merely focused on whether the driveway was only accessible, not “generally accessible.” Moreover, McCormack suggested that it would be difficult to find a place that would not be “generally accessible to motor vehicles.” If the Legislature wanted to outlaw drunk driving everywhere, McCormack posited, it could have easily done so.
Full opinion here.