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Council of Republic passes bill that provides for confiscating vehicles from repeat DUI offenders

 

The Council of the Republic on June 28 passed a bill that provides for confiscating motor vehicles from drivers if they are caught driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs for the second time within a year.

Under the bill, vehicles would be confiscated from repeat offenders irrespective of whether or not they are their owners. Stolen vehicles and vehicles used without their owners’ consent would be the only exception.

The bill also provides for increasing the fines for people arrested for drunk driving for first time from between 15 and 35 times the Base Rate to between 50 and 100 times the Base Rate, or between five million and 10 million rubels at present (between $569 and $1,138) and for imposing prison terms on drunk drivers.

The bill is not unconstitutional because the constitution’s Article 23 implies that the exercise of proprietary rights should not damage other people, Prosecutor General Alyaksandr Kanyuk told the Council of the Republic on Friday.

He said that regulations would probably have to be amended to require people driving motor vehicles that are not registered in their names to have letters of attorney.

Mr. Kanyuk later told reporters that the confiscated vehicles might be used to set up a fund to pay compensation to victims of both traffic offenses and other crimes, thefts, for example. The vehicles that will be confiscated from foreign drivers would also be contributed to the fund, he said. According to the interior ministry, between 50,000 and 55,000 people are caught in Belarus every year while driving under the influence. As many as 1,135 repeat DUI offenders were reportedly arrested in 2007, 4,037 in 2008 and about 4,500 in the subsequent years. //BelaPAN