State v. Nagel
| Decision Date | 05 February 1986 |
| Docket Number | No. 2100,2100 |
| Citation | 506 N.E.2d 285,30 Ohio App.3d 80 |
| Parties | , 30 O.B.R. 136 The STATE of Ohio, Appellee, v. NAGEL, Appellant. * |
| Court | Ohio Court of Appeals |
Syllabus by the Court
The observation by a trained police officer of a defendant's performance of a gaze nystagmus field sobriety test is admissible without expert interpretation.
Peggy J. Schmitz, Asst. Pros. Atty., for appellee.
James L. Kimbler, Lodi, for appellant.
Defendant-appellant, Carl Nagel, appeals his conviction for driving under the influence of alcohol and driving with a prohibited blood-alcohol content pursuant to R.C. 4511.19(A)(1) and (3). This court affirms.
Nagel was stopped on U.S. 250 by State Trooper S.C. Sherrod at about 10:45 p.m., March 24, 1985. The officer observed him traveling at about thirty-five to forty miles per hour in a fifty-five mile per hour zone and weaving both within his lane and across the center line. When the officer activated his overhead lights to pull him over, Nagel stopped in the center passing lane. Sherrod testified that he noticed the odor of alcohol on Nagel's breath and that Nagel passed over his license in his wallet three times before he was able to find it. The officer also observed that Nagel staggered as he walked back to the patrol car and that his eyes were bloodshot and watery.
He swayed and wobbled on a balance test and was unable to perform satisfactorily a number of other field tests administered by the trooper. In addition, the officer said Nagel's eyes jerked and twitched during a gaze nystagmus test, another indication that he had consumed alcohol.
The officer arrested him and took him to the post where he administered a breathalyzer test. The results indicated Nagel had .117 gram by weight of alcohol per two hundred ten liters of his breath. A jury found him guilty on both charges, but he was sentenced only on the driving while under the influence charge.
Nagel argues that the officer should not have been allowed to testify as to the gaze nystagmus test because he was not qualified as an expert and there was no evidence that such test has a proven scientific basis. The test Nagel objects to consists of checking the movement of an individual's eyes as they follow the path of a moving object, such as a pen, before the eyes. It is not comparable, as Nagel contends, to a polygraph test which requires the use of a machine, the scientific reliability of which may be questioned. The gaze nystagmus test, as do the other commonly used field sobriety tests, requires only the personal observation of the officer administering it. It is objective in nature and does not require expert interpretation. Objective manifestations of insobriety, personally observed by the officer, are always relevant where, as here, the defendant's physical condition is in issue.
Sherrod testified he had attended a one-day training session where he had observed eye reactions in individuals both before and after consumption of alcohol. The eyes of those who have consumed alcohol, he said, jerk in their sockets and twitch or bounce at the corners as they follow...
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...notice. Some jurisdictions, however, including Ohio, have held that the HGN test is not scientific evidence. In State v. Nagel, 30 Ohio App.3d 80, 506 N.E.2d 285, 286 (1986), the court It is not comparable ... to a polygraph test which requires the use of a machine, the scientific reliabili......
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