Zero-Tolerance For Cough Syrup

The state Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a one-year driver's license suspension for a 16-year-old motorist pulled over by police after she allegedly drank some cough medicine for a cold.

The justices upheld a 1993 California law in which motorists under 21 automatically lose driving privileges for a year even if a trace amount of alcohol is detected in their blood.

The California Highway Patrol said Karli Bobus had a 0.022 percent blood-alcohol level, the equivalent of roughly one beer's worth of alcohol. The CHP said she was swerving and stuttering in the 2002 incident.

The teen was not prosecuted for drunken driving, which usually requires a blood-alcohol level of about 0.08 percent.

The girl's attorney argued the zero-tolerance law was aimed at minors drinking alcoholic beverages. The teen allegedly had a capful of cough medicine that was 26 percent alcohol.

The 1st District Court of Appeal in San Francisco upheld Bobus' license suspension in January, ruling that "a minor can maim or kill if they drank cough syrup or if they drank beer."

Bobus appealed that decision to the state high court, which upheld the suspension without comment.