In Missouri, when an injurious car accident leads to DWI charges, the possible penalties a driver could face upon conviction are very serious. A strong DWI defense is crucial to protecting a defendant’s rights and freedom. A 44-year-old St. Louis woman will need precisely this kind of defense after her car collided with another vehicle while going the wrong way on a local highway. Two people in the other vehicle were seriously injured, and now the accused driver is up against a number of charges, some of which are felonies. The crash happened shortly before 3 p.m. back on Oct. 13, 2012, but the defendant was only recently charged with misdemeanor assault, felony assault while intoxicated and misdemeanor drunk driving. Both drivers reportedly tried to avoid a collision, but the vehicles nonetheless collided head-on. The woman was said to be unresponsive when police arrived, and they claim to have seen a bottle of vodka on the floorboard of her car. A local report doesn’t indicate whether or not the bottle had been opened. A subsequent blood test showed the woman’s blood-alcohol content to be 0.149 percent. Of course, the legal limit to drive is 0.08 percent. There was no word as to whether the defendant in this case has any prior drunk driving offenses. Still, since the accident in question involved injuries, prosecutors can pursue felony charges, regardless of the defendant’s previous driving record. To protect against possible jail time, heavy fines and the loss of her driver’s license, she will need a strategic and meaningful DWI defense. Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “Wrong-way driver charged with assault, careless driving in Lincoln County crash,” Susan Weich, March 4, 2013