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If you do not have an attorney, the Oregon State Bar Lawyer Referral Service can help you. Online Lawyer Referral Service information and a fill-in form is available. Or you may contact the service by phone: The number to call from the Portland area is 503-684-3763 or toll-free from anywhere else in Oregon, 1-800-452-7636.

The following information about driving with a suspended license is brought to you as a public service by the lawyers of the State of Oregon. The material presented is general legal information intended to alert you to possible legal problems and solutions.

Driving while suspended can be a serious crime. As you will learn from listening to this Tel-Law topic, the legal rules involved are complex and are frequently changed or affected by decisions of the Supreme Court and Court of Appeals. If you are charged with Driving While Suspended, you should immediately consult with an attorney.

It is against Oregon law to drive when your driver's license is suspended or revoked. Breaking this law is called Driving While Suspended, or DWS.

It also is against the law to drive if you don't have a license, and your right to apply for one has been suspended or revoked. The courts often require the Motor Vehicles Division to suspend or revoke a person's driver's license when the person involved does not have a license or has a license from a state other than Oregon. When this happens, the Motor Vehicles Division will suspend or revoke the individual's right to drive or to apply for an Oregon license. A person who drives a motor vehicle at a time when his or her right to apply for an Oregon license has been suspended or revoked also commits the crime of Driving While Suspended.

Driving while suspended is usually an infraction or misdemeanor, which means you can be sentenced to a maximum of one year in jail and fined $5,000. Under certain circumstances, however, the offense may be classified as a felony. One situation where a DWS is a felony is when a person's license was suspended due to conviction for driving under the influence of intoxicants. In such a case, the offense is punishable by imprisonment for not more than five years and a fine of not more than $100,000.

Besides the possibility of a jail sentence and having to pay a fine, the registrations of all the vehicles the convicted person owns are suspended for up to three months. The registration of the vehicle that the convicted person was driving at the time of arrest also will be suspended for up to 120 days. This will happen even if the convicted person is not the owner of the vehicle, and if it is shown that the owner of the vehicle knew or had good reason to know that the convicted person did not have a valid driver's license and still let the suspended driver use his or her vehicle.

The court also can order another penalty for DWS. It can have the vehicle "impounded" for up to three months. This means towed away, locked up, and stored. The convicted person is responsible for the costs of towing and storing the vehicle, and the vehicle will not be returned until these costs are paid. If the vehicle is not claimed and these costs are not paid within 30 days after the impoundment period is up, the vehicle may be sold at public auction.

In certain situations, a license may be revoked. This means the person's right to drive is terminated or ended. The person must get a new license issued if he or she wants to drive again.

Although the crime is called Driving While Suspended, it applies to both suspensions and revocations. Understanding these terms, and the differences between them, may help you to better understand the law. For example, if a person is convicted of assault involving the use of a motor vehicle, the person's license will be revoked.

In other situations, a license may be suspended. This means that a person's right to drive is taken away for a period of time. For example, a conviction for driving while under the influence of intoxicants will result in a suspension for at least one year and, in case of another conviction within a five year period, a suspension for three years.

In some cases, the law requires the Motor Vehicles Division to suspend or revoke a license. This is called a mandatory suspension or revocation. The suspension for a conviction of driving under the influence of intoxicants is an example of a mandatory suspension. In other cases, the law gives the Motor Vehicles Division the power to choose whether or not to suspend a license, as in the case of a driver who becomes incompetent to drive because of ill health. This is known as a permissive suspension. In still other cases, a judge has the power to suspend a license in connection with traffic offense convictions. This type of suspension is called a court-ordered suspension.

Because of the large number of situations that will cause a driver's license to be suspended or revoked, it is impossible to fully discuss the subject in the limited time available during this Tel-Law message. We will therefore discuss the most frequent causes for license suspensions, stressing again, however, that this is not a complete list.

Your license can be suspended for failure to report an accident. Every driver involved in a motor vehicle accident that causes death or injury, or property damage of more than $1000, must file a written accident report within 72 hours of the accident. The report must be filed with the sheriff of the county where the accident occurred, or the chief of police of the city where the accident occurred. Accident report forms are available at every sheriff's office and police station in the state. Failure to report an accident, in addition to being a traffic offense itself, will result in a mandatory suspension that will continue indefinitely until the report is filed.

Another cause of license suspension is failure to appear for a court hearing. Every driver who gets a traffic citation must appear in court at the time and place indicated on the citation or respond to the ticket in some other way as allowed by law, such as mailing in the amount of the required bail. If a driver fails to appear in court when required to do so, it will generally result in an indefinite license suspension until the court appearance is made. Further, a person who knowingly fails to make a court appearance when required to do so may be charged with the crime of failure to appear, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in jail and a $100,000 fine. The court also may issue a warrant for the arrest of any person who fails to appear.

Your license also can be suspended for failure to obey a court order. For example, failure to pay a court-ordered fine or to complete a court-ordered driver safety education program can result in license suspension.

Another cause for license suspension is failure to file proof of future financial responsibility when required to do so.

This usually means getting automobile liability insurance and filing a form known as a "SR-22 form" with the Motor Vehicles Division. There are a number of situations that require a driver to file proof of financial responsibility. The most common are convictions for reckless driving or driving under the influence of intoxicants, or being involved in an accident and not having insurance coverage. If a driver does not file the SR-22, the result will be a mandatory suspension. You should check with your insurance company to make sure that the form gets filed.

Another cause for suspension is failure to take a breath test when you are arrested for driving under the influence of intoxicants and asked by a police officer to take the test. Refusal to take the breath test results in a suspension of one year. If your license is suspended at the time you are stopped or you already have been convicted of DUII, you failed or refused a breath test, or you participated in a diversion program within the last five years, then your license will be suspended for three years for refusing to take the test.

If you do take the test, and it shows that your blood alcohol level is above the legal limit, then your license will be suspended for at least 90 days. It will be suspended for one year if your license is already suspended or if you already have been convicted of DUII. The law says the Motor Vehicles Division must suspend your license for these periods, and it makes no difference whether your DUII cases have not yet been tried, or even that you have gone to trial and been found not guilty.

Remember, these are just the most common reasons for suspension, not all of them. If you have any doubt about your driver's license status, you should call any Motor Vehicles Division field office and request verification.

When a driver's license is suspended or revoked, the Motor Vehicles Division must give notice of such action to the driver. The notice is given by mailing, to the driver, a copy of the suspension or revocation order, doing so by certified mail, restricted delivery, return receipt requested. The notice is sent to the driver's address shown on the Motor Vehicles Division records.

All drivers should be aware that the law requires them to notify the Motor Vehicles Division of any change of address. This must be done within 30 days after the address changes. If the Motor Vehicles Division is not notified of the new address, the suspension notice will be sent to the old address and may end up not being received by the driver. Should this occur, the suspension will still be legal, although unknown to the driver. If the driver then gets a ticket (or gets arrested) for DWS, the fact that the driver did not know about the suspension will not be considered as a defense to the charge.

Also, refusing to sign the certified mail receipt or simply allowing the notice to go unclaimed will not prevent the suspension from going into effect.

In most cases, the driver has a right to a hearing before a Motor Vehicles Division hearings officer if he or she wishes to fight the suspension. The request for a hearing must be made within a certain period of time, sometimes as little as 10 days, as specified in the notice of suspension. If written application is made within the time limit, the date on which the suspension goes into effect will be postponed in most (but not all) cases until the hearing is over. It is important to understand that in a prosecution for Driving While Suspended, the state does not have to prove that the driver knew that his or her license was suspended. Lack of such knowledge is not a defense in Oregon.

The law provides only two defenses to a charge of Driving While Suspended. First, it is a defense if the driving was made necessary because of a real emergency. Such an emergency exists when there is an injury or immediate threat of injury to human or animal life, coupled with great urgency of circumstances making it necessary to drive a motor vehicle at the time and place in question. Second, under certain limited circumstances, it may be asserted that the defendant had not received the notice of suspension in the manner provided by Oregon law. However, this defense may not be asserted if the driver had changed his or her address and failed to notify the Motor Vehicles Division; if the driver refused to sign the receipt for the certified mail that contained the suspension notice; if the driver had been informed by a judge at a previous court appearance that the license was being suspended; or if the driver had actual knowledge of the suspension by any means prior to the time he or she was stopped on the current charge.

Lastly, if a person whose license has been suspended must drive in connection with a job or to get to and from work, a hardship permit may be issued. The hardship permit will allow a limited amount of driving during specified times and specified purpose only. Driving outside the restrictions of such a license is still Driving While Suspended.

You should check with the Motor Vehicles Division or a lawyer to see if you might qualify for a hardship permit. In all cases, however, the driver will be required to file proof of future financial responsibility.

This information is from the Oregon State Bar's Tel-law service, a collection of recorded legal information messages prepared by the lawyers of Oregon. In addition to being online, the Tel-law service is accessible by telephone at 503-620-3000 or toll-free in Oregon only, 1-800-452-4776. A touch tone phone allows direct access 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To receive a free Tel-law brochure listing the subjects available call 503-620-0222, ext. 0.