Felony DUI Attorney in Cobb County
Former Prosecutors Defending Felony DUI Charges in Cobb County
A felony DUI isn’t a more serious version of a standard DUI. It’s a legally distinct charge that moves to Cobb County Superior Court, carries mandatory prison time, and creates a permanent record that can’t be erased. At Smith, Schnatmeier, Dettmering & Kilgo, LLP, our team includes former District Attorneys who know how the prosecution builds a felony DUI case because they’ve built them. That background, combined with over 100 years of combined litigation experience in criminal defense, shapes how we approach these cases from day one.
Facing a felony DUI charge in Cobb County? Call us at (770) 599-5328 to schedule a confidential consultation. The sooner you act, the more options may be available to you.When a DUI Becomes a Felony in Georgia
Most DUI charges are misdemeanors, but Georgia law elevates certain DUIs to felony status under specific circumstances. Which statute applies to your situation matters immediately, because the charge determines the court, the penalties, and the defense strategy.
- Fourth Offense (O.C.G.A. § 40-6-391): A fourth DUI conviction within 10 years, measured by arrest dates with all offenses on or after July 1, 2008, is a felony. The 10-year window runs from arrest to arrest, not conviction to conviction.
- Serious Injury by Vehicle (O.C.G.A. § 40-6-394): Causing serious bodily injury to another person while driving under the influence is a felony regardless of prior DUI history, carrying 1 to 15 years in prison per victim.
- Vehicular Homicide, First Degree (O.C.G.A. § 40-6-393): A DUI that results in a death carries 3 to 15 years in prison per person killed.
- Habitual Violator Causing Death: A driver declared a habitual violator who drives on a revoked license and causes the death of another person faces 5 to 20 years per death under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-393(d).
A first-time DUI offender with no prior record can face felony charges if the incident involved serious injury or a fatality. There is no prior-offense requirement for those charges.
Penalties for a Fourth-Offense Felony DUI in Georgia
The consequences under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-391(c)(4) are severe and largely non-negotiable at sentencing. A conviction carries 1 to 5 years in state prison, with a mandatory minimum of 90 days of actual incarceration that cannot be suspended, stayed, or probated. That minimum is statutory and cannot be reduced regardless of circumstances at sentencing.
Additional mandatory penalties include fines between $1,000 and $5,000 that can’t be suspended, a minimum of 480 hours of community service unless the court imposes 3 or more years of actual imprisonment, and license revocation of up to five years. After two years of revocation, a driver may apply for a probationary license for the remaining period. A felony DUI conviction is permanent under Georgia law and can’t be expunged or restricted from a criminal record.
Felony DUI Cases Belong in Cobb County Superior Court
All felony DUI charges in Cobb County are handled in Cobb County Superior Court in Marietta. That distinction matters. Unlike misdemeanor DUI proceedings in state or municipal court, Superior Court cases may involve a grand jury indictment, formal arraignment, pretrial motion practice, and a jury trial before one of the court’s ten elected judges. The process is more involved, the stakes are higher, and familiarity with the court’s procedures and judges carries real weight.
Smith, Schnatmeier, Dettmering & Kilgo, LLP represents clients in Cobb County Superior Court and throughout the Cobb County judicial circuit. Our attorneys practice in this courthouse regularly, know its procedures, and bring that familiarity to every felony DUI case we handle here.
Why Our Prosecutorial Background Changes the Defense
Our attorneys include former District Attorneys who prosecuted cases for the state of Georgia. That experience isn’t background color. It means we read a felony DUI case file the way a prosecutor does, identifying what the state considers its strongest evidence and where the weaknesses are. Defense strategy built on prosecutorial knowledge looks different from strategy built only from the defense side.
Attorney Schnatmeier holds a 10.0 Superb Avvo rating, a Super Lawyers listing, and an AV Preeminent® rating by Martindale-Hubbell. Smith, Schnatmeier, Dettmering & Kilgo, LLP is listed in Best Law Firms by U.S. News and World Report. Our clients facing felony DUI charges receive direct, consistent communication at every stage of the case. In a matter this serious, you shouldn’t have to wonder where things stand.
Act Before the Deadlines Close Your Options
After a felony DUI arrest in Cobb County, you have 30 days to act on your driver’s license. That administrative clock runs separately from your criminal case and requires its own immediate attention. The criminal case carries its own early deadlines for evidence preservation, grand jury proceedings, and pretrial motions. Waiting narrows your options on both tracks.
Our felony DUI lawyers in Cobb County handle both from the start. We can advise you on the ALS process, review every piece of evidence, and build a defense grounded in over 100 years of combined criminal litigation experience and prosecutorial insight that few defense firms can match.
Call Smith, Schnatmeier, Dettmering & Kilgo, LLP at (770) 599-5328 or use our online contact form to schedule a confidential consultation about your felony DUI charge.
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Hear from those we've represented in their legal battles.
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Mr. Schnatmeier made the experience as painless as possible. He was very responsive and I was pleasantly surprised by how available he was.
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Felony DUI Defense Strategies in Cobb County
Felony DUI cases are built on layers of evidence, and each layer can be examined and challenged. Our approach starts with a full review of police reports, body cam and dash cam footage, chemical test maintenance and calibration records, and witness statements. Every document is a potential source of issues to litigate before trial or at trial itself.
Challenging the Stop & Arrest
An officer must have reasonable articulable suspicion to initiate a traffic stop and probable cause to make a DUI arrest. If either standard wasn’t met, a suppression motion, a pretrial request asking the court to exclude evidence obtained through the unlawful stop or arrest, may be available. Evidence excluded through a successful suppression motion can’t be used at trial, which can substantially change the strength of the state’s case.
Field Sobriety & Chemical Test Challenges
Our attorneys are trained to identify whether field sobriety evaluations were administered according to required protocols and to hold officers accountable when they weren’t. Breath-testing equipment must be properly calibrated and maintained; gaps in those records are grounds to challenge the reliability of the results. In felony cases involving serious injury or a fatality, the defense may also contest the causal link between alleged impairment and the injury and scrutinize blood draw procedures and chain-of-custody documentation.
When key evidence is suppressed, a charge may be reduced or, depending on the remaining evidence, a case may be dismissed. The outcome in any individual case depends on the specific facts and evidence involved.
Challenging Prior Convictions in Fourth-Offense Felony DUI Cases
The felony threshold under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-391 depends on three prior DUI convictions within the 10-year lookback window. That dependency creates a defense angle unique to fourth-offense cases: if one or more of those prior convictions can be successfully challenged, the current charge may not qualify as a felony at all.
Prior convictions may be challengeable on several grounds, including a conviction obtained without proper legal representation, one based on an invalid guilty or nolo contendere plea, or one that falls outside the 10-year arrest-date window. It’s worth noting that a nolo contendere plea to a prior DUI counts as a conviction for purposes of Georgia’s enhancement statute, so a careful review of prior case records is essential, not just the final disposition.
The stakes of a successful prior-conviction challenge are significant. Reducing the charge from a felony to a maximum of 12 months in county jail moves the case out of Superior Court entirely. Whether a prior conviction can be challenged depends on the specific facts and documentation available in each case.
