New Off-Label Use for Botox: DUI Defense

October 25th, 2010. By janem

Barbie has trouble with breathalyzers, too!

No one expects to get caught drinking and driving, but as a precautionary measure you might want to consider getting Botox treatments, well maybe not… Anyway, it worked for a woman in Vancouver, BC who used the Botox defense during her trial on a charge of refusing to give a breath sample in provincial court.

Paddi Anne Moore, 51, was given four chances to blow into a breathalyzer the night she was pulled over. The equipment failed to record a sample because she couldn’t wrap her lips properly around the roadside device: apparently, the Botox had frozen her face. It didn’t stop Ms. Moore from talking though: she acknowledged to Cpl Fred Harding, the cop who pulled her over, that she had indeed been drinking alcohol that night. “If you can speak, you can inhale some kind of air from your mouth,” said Harding.

Judge Carol Ellan didn’t see eye to eye, or should I say, lip to lip, with Harding. She dismissed the charge against Moore, much to Harding’s chagrin.

“I’ve never seen anyone who had the gall to go into court and say Botox was their defence,” said Harding, who might want to consider a few rounds of Botox for another off-label use: headaches! He also said that the Botox defense could open up a new set of defenses for drunk drivers to beat the charge. “The absurdity is hard to fathom.”

I’ve gotta hand it to Ms. Moore—she did her homework before representing herself during the trial. She had her Mexican Botox doctor write a letter, which she handed to the judge in court. He wrote that, “the physical effects of Botox injections to the upper lip and mouth area is that the patient is unable to purse [her] lips or whistle… and it is not uncommon for someone to be unable to wrap their lips around a straw or wide circumference such as a breathalyzer blow apparatus” for up to six months.

This was posted on Monday, October 25th, 2010 at 4:56 pm and is filed under Emerging Issues . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.