Administrative license suspension

An administrative license suspension is action taken against a driving privilege by a state licensing authority after a DUI arrest. It is a separate track from the criminal charge, which is decided in a criminal court. The names differ under each state's law: Nebraska's statute speaks of revocation by the director, Arkansas's statute of suspension, disqualification, revocation or denial by the Office of Driver Services, and PennDOT's Driver's Manual of a licensing sanction.

Who reviews the action differs across the states in the examples. Under New Mexico's N.M. Stat. Ann. § 66-8-112, a requested hearing is set by the administrative hearings office, which issues the order following that hearing. PennDOT's manual, which is agency guidance rather than a statute, says a sanction may be appealed in the Court of Common Pleas (Civil Division) in the county of residence. The hearing guides and state pages cover how review works.

The licensing action is tied to events at the arrest rather than to a verdict. Nebraska's statute, Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-498.02, for example, directs the director to revoke the operator's license of a person arrested for refusal to submit to a chemical test of blood, breath or urine, and of a person who submits to a test that discloses the alcohol concentration the statute cross-references. The revocation follows either the expiration of a period after the arrest or a hearing in which the director finds that the license should be revoked.

The trigger described in that provision is the arrest together with the test result or refusal, not a conviction. The length of a Nebraska revocation differs depending on whether the person refused or submitted to the test, and on the person's record of prior administrative license revocations; those figures belong on the Nebraska state page.

Nebraska's Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-498.01 makes the revocation effective a set period after the date of arrest where the arresting officer serves the notice, or a set period after mailing where the director serves it by mail. Under Arkansas's A.C.A. § 5-65-402, where a seized license has not expired and appears valid to the officer, the officer's dated receipt constitutes notice of a suspension, disqualification or revocation by the Office of Driver Services, effective after a stated period.

PennDOT's manual says a sanction starts on the effective date listed in the notice of sanction, and that surrendering a license early does not start it early. New Mexico's N.M. Stat. Ann. § 66-8-112 sets the effective date a period after notice of revocation or, if the person requests a hearing, on the date the administrative hearings office issues the order following that hearing. The periods themselves appear on the state pages.

The arresting officer's sworn report matters, but Nebraska and Arkansas treat a late report differently. Nebraska's statute has a branch for cases in which a chemical test indicates the cross-referenced alcohol concentration, the results were not available to the officer while the person was in custody, and the officer did not serve the notice of revocation. In that mailed-notice branch, the officer forwards a sworn report to the director, and if the report is not received within the statutory period, the revocation does not take effect. That rule belongs to the mailed-notice branch only.

Arkansas's statute takes a different approach for its officer-issued notice: the failure of the arresting officer to timely file the sworn report does not affect the authority of the Office of Driver Services to suspend, disqualify or revoke the driving privilege of the arrested person.

In Nebraska, the outcome of the criminal case can reach back into the license case, but only for revocations under the subsection of Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-498.01 that Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-498.02 cross-references. For those revocations, the person has all proceedings dismissed or the license immediately reinstated without the reinstatement fee once the director receives suitable evidence that the prosecutor declined to file, or dismissed before trial, a charge under the cross-referenced DUI statute or a conforming city or village ordinance; that the person was found not guilty after trial; or that the court in the criminal action held that the officer lacked probable cause, or that the person was not operating or in actual physical control of a vehicle while having an alcohol concentration in violation of that statute or ordinance.

The link runs both ways. If a charge is filed or refiled after the revocation proceedings were dismissed on this basis, the director may reinstate the revocation, except where it was dismissed under Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-498.01. A lawyer in Nebraska can explain whether this provision reaches a particular revocation.

Serving the sanction is not always the end of the license case. Nebraska's statute provides that a person may have eligibility for a license reinstated upon payment of a reinstatement fee. For a nonresident, Nebraska revokes only the nonresident's operating privilege, as Nebraska law defines it, and immediately forwards the operator's license and a statement of the order of revocation to the person's state of residence.

PennDOT's manual says that, in addition to serving the sanction, all restoration requirements must be satisfied before the driving privilege is restored. How review of a license action is requested, and by when, is set by the issuing state's law and covered in the guide on requesting a license hearing.

Deadlines, limits and penalty ranges are set by each state’s statutes, so this page does not state them. Each state page shows them with the official source and the date they were verified — or says plainly that a figure has not been confirmed yet.