On August 8, 2024, the New Jersey Supreme Court decided the Ocean County case of State v. Zingis. The principal issue concerned the procedure for challenging Trooper Dennis cases through post-conviction relief proceedings during the pendency of a subsequent DWI charge.
Justice Noriega wrote for the unanimous Court in relevant part: In State v. Cassidy, 235 N.J. 482, 486 (2018), the Court addressed the consequences of then-Sergeant Marc Dennis’s certification of improperly conducted calibration checks of certain Alcotest machines “used to determine whether a driver’s blood alcohol content is above the legal limit,” which called into question over 20,000 Alcotest results. In this appeal, the Court addresses issues arising from the notification procedure required after Cassidy. In August 2018, defendant Thomas Zingis was charged with careless driving and driving while under the influence (DWI). He had a prior DWI conviction in April 2012. In December 2018, a trial was held in the municipal court and Zingis was found guilty of DWI. The State requested that Zingis be sentenced as a second offender due to his April 2012 DWI conviction. Relying on Cassidy, Zingis argued that his first conviction should be disregarded for sentencing purposes because the State failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that his 2012 DWI conviction was not predicated on a Dennis-calibrated Alcotest. The State responded by asserting that (1) Camden was not one of the Dennis-affected counties, and (2) Zingis’s failure to receive notice, consistent with this Court’s order in Cassidy, was proof that he was not a Dennis-affected defendant. The municipal court accepted the prosecutor’s representation and sentenced Zingis as a second DWI offender. On appeal, the Law Division also found Zingis guilty of DWI and rejected his request to be sentenced as a first-time offender. The Appellate Division affirmed Zingis’s conviction but vacated the enhanced sentence. 471 N.J. Super. 590, 608 (App. Div. 2022).
The Appellate Division held that the State failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zingis’s 2012 DWI conviction was not based on an inadmissible Alcohol Influence Report (AIR). The Court granted certification and remanded the matter to a Special Adjudicator for a plenary hearing on two questions: (1) which counties were affected by Dennis’s conduct, and (2) what notification was provided to defendants affected by Dennis’s conduct.
Justice Noriega did criminal defense and immigration work before he was nominated to the New Jersey Supreme Court. He and I presented a seminar together regarding the intersection of criminal law with immigration cases.
