Background
Urbandale police stopped Plu Reh for traffic violations. Reh followed field-sobriety-test instructions given in English but displayed signs of intoxication. He told police that he had lived in the United States for ten years.
At the county jail, Reh requested an interpreter fluent in Karenni, his native language. The language service had no Karenni interpreter available, but Reh said he also spoke some Burmese and chose to receive the implied-consent and Iowa Code section 804.20 advisories through a Burmese interpreter. After police declined his later suggestion that a friend translate, Reh signed the consent forms and took a breath test showing an alcohol concentration more than twice the legal limit. He conditionally pleaded guilty to second-offense operating while intoxicated after the district court denied suppression, preserving that ruling for appeal.
The Court’s Holding
The Iowa Court of Appeals held that police made reasonable efforts to convey the implied-consent advisory to Reh. Reviewing the record de novo while deferring to the district court’s factual findings, the court relied on Reh’s appropriate responses to English questions and instructions, his ability to converse with the Burmese interpreter without apparent difficulty, the unavailability of a Karenni interpreter, and the time-sensitive nature of breath testing.
The court also declined to require officers to use less reliable translation methods, such as an automated internet service or Reh’s unidentified friend. Concluding that the district court accurately summarized the evidence and correctly applied the governing reasonable-efforts standard, the court affirmed without further opinion under Iowa Court Rule 21.26(1)(e).
Key Takeaways
- When a defendant does not speak English, the governing inquiry is whether police made reasonable efforts to communicate the implied-consent advisory.
- A defendant’s demonstrated ability to understand English and the unavailability of an interpreter in the defendant’s native language are relevant to that inquiry.
- The court declined to impose a rule requiring officers to use potentially less reliable alternatives such as automated internet translation or a defendant’s friend.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces that Iowa’s implied-consent analysis turns on the reasonableness of the officers’ communication efforts under the circumstances, not on whether the advisory was delivered in the defendant’s preferred or native language.
For suppression disputes involving language barriers, contemporaneous video and evidence of how the defendant responded to officers and an available interpreter may be important in determining whether the advisory was adequately conveyed.