The Accuracy of Handheld Pre-Arrest Breath Test Instruments as a Predictor of the Evidential Breath Alcohol Test Results

摘要

Drunk driving is a serious threat to public safety. All available and appropriate tools for curbing this threat should be employed to their full extent. The handheld pre-arrest breath test instrument (PBT) is one tool for identifying the alcohol-impaired driver and enforcing drunk driving legislation. A set of data was evaluated (n=1779) where the PBT instrument was employed in drunk driving arrests to develop a multivariate predictive model. When maintained and operated by trained personnel, the PBT provides a reasonable estimate of the evidential test result within the relevant forensic range (95% prediction interval: +/- 0.003g/210L). ROC analysis shows that a multivariate model for PBT prediction of the evidentiary alcohol concentration above versus below the legal limit of 0.08g/210L has excellent performance with an AUC of 0.96. These results would be of value in evidential hearings seeking to admit the PBT results in drunk driving trials.