LexisNexis Practice Guide: Pennsylvania DUI Law

Steven F. Fairlie has been designated a Pennsylvania “SuperLawyer” in both Personal Injury and Criminal Defense by Philadelphia Magazine and placed on their lists of the Top 100 Lawyers in Pennsylvania and the Top 100 Lawyers in Philadelphia, The National Trial Lawyers Top 100 Trial Lawyers, Top Rated Attorneys in Pennsylvania as published in The Wall Street Journal, Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Legal Intelligencer, The National Association of Distinguished Counsel, The National Advocacy for DUI Defense Top 100 Driving Under the Influence (DUI) Attorneys, and is a holder of Martindale-Hubbell’s prestigious “AV” rating and Client Distinction Award, designating preeminent lawyers based upon legal ability, ethics, and client satisfaction. He has been rated a perfect 10.0/10.0 on www.avvo.com. and is one of a just 35 attorneys in Pennsylvania to be named a “Lawyer on the Fast Track” by The Legal Intelligencer in 2006. He has been named a Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America (awarded to less than one-half percent of judges, lawyers, and scholars in America), received the National Academy of Criminal Defense Attorneys Top 10 Attorney Award, and been named a Top 100 Criminal Defense Lawyer by the American Society of Legal Advocates. He has won many other awards for his trial work that are simply too numerous to list here.

He has successfully handled numerous civil (slip and fall, auto accidents, land development litigation, etc.) and criminal trials (narcotics, DUI, capital murder, robbery, rape, etc.). Prior to private practice, he worked on the Narcotics Team and the Major Crimes Team of the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office from 1996 to 2000. He successfully argued for the death penalty in 1999 and was lead prosecutor in a case involving $55 million of cocaine. Subsequently, as a defense attorney, he took the appeal of a client sentenced to death and convinced the prosecutor to vacate the death sentence. He used forensic tire print evidence to prove another client not guilty of attempted murder. In yet another case he uncovered evidence which reduced the offer on a robbery case from 25–50 years down to 2 years probation. He represented one individual charged with 3 separate charges of DUI and had the first case dismissed at the Preliminary Hearing, the second accepted into the A.R.D. program, and the third case dismissed after a trial judge granted suppression of all evidence in the case. Mr. Fairlie has obtained not-guilty verdicts in major jury trials involving shootings, burglaries, etc. despite positive eyewitness identifications of his clients. On appeal, he has successfully argued for reversal of a death sentence in one case and a sentence of 70 years in another case. Other successful plea negotiations include 2 1/2 to 5 years in the case of a man who struck his wife in the head with a hammer and strangled her and 6 to 12 years in a First Degree Murder case. In another First Degree Murder case he negotiated a plea to Third Degree Murder and then obtained a sentence of 2–5 years at a contested sentencing hearing.

In 2007, Mr. Fairlie went to trial on a case involving more than $50 million of land transactions and settled the case in the second week of trial. He has obtained six-figure settlements in numerous personal injury cases, including car accident, back injury, and dog bite cases.

Mr. Fairlie often serves as a speaker for various organizations such as the Pennsylvania Bar Institute’s Annual Criminal Law Symposium in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Montgomery and Bucks County Bar Associations, and various law enforcement training programs. He also teaches numerous other continuing legal education seminars for lawyers every year.

He earned his B.A. in Government and Law from Lafayette College in 1991 and his J.D. from The Dickinson School of Law in 1995 where he was a member of the Appellate Moot Court Board, the Environmental Law Journal, and a Chairman of the Student Bar Association. He has been Co-Chairman or Chairman of the Montgomery County Bar Association’s Criminal Defense Committee since 2001, a member of the Montgomery County Bar Association’s Judiciary Committee and Trial Lawyers’ Section, a member of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Professionalism Committee and Civil Litigation Section, a member of the Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers Hotline Panel of Experts Committee, a member of the Montgomery County Sexual Assault Task Force, a member of The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and an Associate Member of the Philadelphia Bar Association. Mr. Fairlie’s areas of practice include Criminal Defense, DUI Defense, and Personal Injury.

Matthew Brittenburg has successfully represented clients charged with criminal offenses ranging from offenses D.U.I. to homicide and everything in between. He is admitted to practice in Pennsylvania and New Jersey in both state and federal courts.

Over the past ten years, he has tried a multitude of cases to verdict and through all phases of litigation. In the context of D.U.I. cases, Matt has tried and litigated hundreds of D.U.I. cases in jury and bench trials, suppression hearings, spoliation motions and pretrial motions arguments. As a former assistant district attorney assigned to Montgomery County's former D.U.I. Prosecution Unit, Matt oversaw the litigation of thousands of D.U.I. cases over several years. Matt is intimately familiar with the complex and ever-developing issues common to D.U.I. cases.

Matt graduated from the University of Pittsburgh and the Temple University Beasley School of Law.