Another Victory From the Appellate Courts

On October 11, 2019, the Oklahoma Court of Civil Appeals reversed a Tulsa County judge and found in favor of our client. In February 2018, M. Cole (“Licensee”) was arrested for suspicion of DUI and his license was taken by the arresting officer.

As a result of the arrest, DPS wanted to revoke his license for five years. Luckily, the Licensee hired the Tulsa DUI Guy who appealed the case all the way to the appellate courts.

The premise of the decision is whether DPS could deny a Licensee the right to an administrative hearing if the Licensee timely faxed in a request for hearing. DPS recently changed their procedure for accepting a request for hearing after a person was arrested for DUI. Instead of modernizing their office and accepting requests by fax and email, like they previously did, DPS went prehistoric and insisted all requests must be in writing and either snail-mailed or hand-delivered. DPS employed this tactic to reduce the number of hearings we win and tried to deprive the citizens of this State their right to due process.

The Appeals Court determined DPS violated the Licensee’s right to due process since DPS acknowledged they received a timely request for hearing via fax, but revoked the Licensees driving privileges without giving him a hearing. As a result, the Licensee will not lose his driving privileges at all and this matter is new, legal, binding precedence for DPS shenanigans in the future.