Arizona has passed new DUI laws for 2011 which in general have decreased the penalty for all DUI convictions. Some of these include:

1) Mandatory Jail sentence time ha been decreased significantly. There is quite a bit of legalese that is associated with this change. In any case the bottom line is that the judges have a lot more leeway to decrease jail time for non-extreme as well as extreme DUI convictions

2) The requirement for an interlock device has been rduced to 6 months from 12 months in cases of non-extreme DUI

3) Detention in the home is now available and the judges will have significantly greater discretion to use ankle bracelets in order to defer long jail sentences

4) Restricted driving permits will now be allowed where before licenses were summarily suspended.

There are mny other chenges to the law with a big one being that the right to a jury trial was removed for all first time non-extreme DUI charges. But, second DUI and extreme DUI charges have a right to a jury trial. More to come with additional updates on this change.