Judge Dismisses Draeger Breath Test Defect Class Action Lawsuit

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On Monday, Oct. 28, a New Jersey federal judge dismissed a putative class action lawsuit filed by convicted drunk drivers accusing Draeger Safety Diagnostics Inc. of manufacturing defective blood alcohol testing devices, finding that the plaintiffs improperly requested the court to reject judgments from the state court.

Bobby Johnson and Edwin Aguaiza filed the class action lawsuit to challenge the accuracy of the results obtained by law enforcement officers using Draeger’s Alcotest 7110 machines. Johnson was arrested for drunk driving in 2010 after a breath test with the Alcotest 7110 reported a blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.13 percent. Aguaiza was arrested for drunk driving in 2011 after a breath test on the Alcotest 7110 reported a BAC of 0.11 percent. Under New Jersey law, individuals can be found guilty of driving while intoxicated if they operate a motor vehicle with a BAC of 0.08 percent or more.

In their class action lawsuit, Johnson and Aguaiza accused Draeger of designing the BAC tester with no mechanism to ensure accuracy. Further, they accused the company’s executives of committing fraud by testifying under oath that the Alcotest 7110 accurately detects BAC and requires no maintenance after the initial calibration of the device.

U.S. District Judge Jose L. Linares dismissed the class action lawsuit after determining that it violated the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which prohibits federal courts from reviewing decisions made in state courts prior to the filing of the federal lawsuit. A claim is also barred under the doctrine if it is “’inextricably intertwined with (the) state adjudication,’ meaning that ‘federal relief can only be predicated upon a conviction that the state court was wrong.’”

According to Judge Linares, for the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to apply, the class action lawsuit must meet four requirements: “(1) the federal plaintiff lost in state court; (2) the plaintiff ‘complain(s) of injuries caused by (the) state-court judgments’; (3) those judgments were rendered before the federal suit was filed; and (4) the plaintiff is inviting the district court to review and reject the state judgments.”

Judge Linares clarified that the plaintiffs’ class action lawsuit asked the court to determine whether the Alcotest 7110 has a design defect under the New Jersey Product Liability Act and whether Draeger’s executives falsely testified that the BAC testing device was reliable in a case before the New Jersey Supreme Court.

“The New Jersey Supreme Court has already concluded that the Alcotest was – and remains – ‘scientifically reliable’ for the purpose for which it was designed – to test breath samples to determine blood-alcohol concentration,” Judge Linares said in his decision to dismiss the class action lawsuit. “Thus, a finding by this court that the Alcotest contains a defect for the purpose for which it was designed would effectively prevent the enforcement of the state court’s orders upon which plaintiffs’ criminal convictions were based.”

According to Judge Linares, the Rooker-Feldman doctrine bars a plaintiff to seek relief that would prevent a state court from enforcing its orders. Similarly, if he found that a Draeger executive lied under oath, the decision would “render ineffectual the state court’s orders upon which the plaintiffs’ convictions were based.”

The plaintiffs are represented by Ashton E. Thomas of the Law Office of Ashton E. Thomas.

The Draeger Breath Test Defect Class Action Lawsuit is Bobby Johnson, et al. v. Draeger Safety Diagnostics Inc., Case No. 2:13-cv-02439, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

UPDATE: The plaintiffs’ attorneys have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, arguing that the 3rd U.S. Court of Appeals erred in upholding the dismissal of the Draeger breathalyzer class action lawsuit. They argue that the appellate court’s finding that the claims were precluded by state court was erroneous because the case had never been brought to New Jersey state court.