State v. Tew

Judge COZORT

dissenting.

I do not disagree with the majority’s literal interpretation of the specific statute at issue here. Nonetheless, I believe that, when this specific statute is considered in pari materia with the rest of the statutes on procedures governing chemical analyses, the General Assembly did not intend for the evidence of breathalyzer readings to be suppressed when the “rounded down” readings are within .02. Cf. Pollard v. Smith, 324 N.C. 424, 378 S.E.2d 771 (1989).

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-139.1 permits the admission in evidence of the lower reading of a pair of consecutively…