Rothweiler v. Superior Court

In Rothweiler v. Superior Court, 100 Ariz. 37, 410 P.2d 479 (1966), the Arizona Supreme Court ruled, based on article II, 24 of the Arizona Constitution, that misdemeanor DUI defendants have the right to a jury trial. 100 Ariz. at 45, 410 P.2d at 485. The court adopted a three-part test for determining when an offense was a petty offense that did not warrant a jury trial, considering: the severity of the penalty; the moral quality of the act; the act's relation to common law crimes. Id. at 42, 410 P.2d at 483. Finding that DUI had no relation to common law petty offenses, the supreme court based its ruling on its analysis of the first two parts of the test. Id. at 43-44, 410 P.2d at 484-85. In Derendal v. Griffith, 209 Ariz. 416, 104 P.3d 147 (2005), the court modified the Rothweiler test by eliminating the "moral quality" part. 209 Ariz. 416, P32, 104 P.3d at 155. The court also ruled that any offense punishable by no more than six months' imprisonment is presumptively a petty offense for which there is no constitutional right to a jury trial. Id. P21. But that presumption, it held, may be overcome if a defendant can establish that "the offense carries additional severe, direct, uniformly applied, statutory consequences." Id. P37.