In a DWI crash case, intoxication alone is not enough — the State must prove your driving caused the injury or death. That single word, "caused," is where many felony intoxication assault and intoxication manslaughter cases are won or lost. If another driver, a road hazard, weather, or a mechanical failure caused the crash, causation fails — and a felony can fall to a misdemeanor DWI or a dismissal. This is the exact terrain our attorneys worked on the Vehicular Crimes Team.
If you or a loved one is facing a DWI crash case in Houston, Harris County, or Galveston, Brian Foley and Luis Baez can help.
Why Causation Is the Battleground
The felony intoxication statutes require the State to prove that your intoxicated operation caused the result. That means a crash case has two independent questions: Were you intoxicated? And did your driving cause the injury or death? A strong defense attacks both — and causation is frequently the more winnable of the two, because real crashes rarely have a single, simple cause.
What Crash Investigation Examines
| Evidence | What it can show |
|---|---|
| Event data recorder ("black box") | Speed, braking, throttle in the seconds before impact |
| Skid marks & points of impact | Angles, speeds, and who entered whose lane |
| Vehicle damage | Direction and force of the collision |
| Roadway & conditions | Design defects, visibility, weather contributions |
| Witness & video evidence | Independent accounts of how the crash unfolded |
Vehicles are often released, repaired, or scrapped within weeks, and event-data recorders can be lost. Getting a defense team and an independent reconstructionist involved early can make the difference between preserving decisive evidence and losing it forever.
How We Fight It
- Independent reconstruction. We retain qualified accident-reconstruction experts to build an alternative, evidence-based account of the crash.
- Preserving vehicle and scene data. We move quickly to secure event-data recorders, the vehicles, and scene measurements.
- Alternative causes. Another driver, a hazard, road design, or a mechanical failure can be the true cause.
- Challenging intoxication too. We simultaneously attack the stop, field sobriety testing, and blood evidence.
- Insider knowledge. Because our attorneys built these cases as prosecutors, we know the State's reconstruction methods and their weaknesses.
Related Pages
- Intoxication Assault
- Intoxication Manslaughter
- DWI With a Vehicle Crash
- Failure to Stop and Render Aid
- Vehicular Crimes Team
Why HCDA
Brian Foley is Board Certified in Criminal Law, and both he and Luis Baez are former prosecutors who served on the Vehicular Crimes Team with training in accident reconstruction and crash investigation. If you or a loved one is facing a DWI crash case in Houston, Harris County, or Galveston, contact Houston Criminal Defense Attorneys PLLC for a free, confidential consultation. Call or text (713) 703-1718.