DUI — first offence

The client had no prior record. The immediate concerns were the licence suspension already in effect, the interlock timeline, and how any conviction would ripple through insurance and employment.

First-offence DUI is the file type where the practical consequences of a conviction — well beyond the courtroom penalty itself — are most often the real issue for the client.

Whether the Crown case supported a full defence, a plea to the offence as charged, or a resolution to a lesser regulatory offence where that was legally available on the record.

Independent of the substantive question: how to sequence the enrolment into the Reduced Suspension with Ignition Interlock programme so the client's licence timeline stayed as short as possible.

Disclosure review as the first step — because the Crown case dictates the resolution options.

Client-facing walk-through of every option: contested trial, plea to the offence, plea to careless driving under the HTA where that was legally available, and the sequencing that goes with each.

Coordination with the client's insurance and employment situation so the resolution chosen actually matched the client's real-world priorities.

• The mandatory minimum for a first offence and the additional exposure for readings over specific thresholds.
• Reduced Suspension with Ignition Interlock — enrolment timing and its effect on the licence.
• Insurance impact of a Criminal Code conviction versus a Highway Traffic Act conviction.
• Immigration and travel consequences a criminal conviction triggers.

The 'first-offence' label understates the real exposure. The practical consequences reach every part of the client's life. The work is in matching the legal options to those consequences.

First-offence DUI files at Saggi Law Firm are worked with both the courtroom and the licence-and-insurance timeline in view.